A review by house_of_hannah
Dark Neighbourhood by Vanessa Onwuemezi

challenging slow-paced

1.5

Reading this gave me the feeling that I get when I'm trying to write or text in a dream. I honestly have no idea how anyone is supposed to understand what's going on in these stories besides the author. It's written in a way where it feels like the words in every other sentence are out of order. There are gaps between words in seemingly random places. I just don't have the brain power to follow what the hell is happening in these stories.

There's a blurb on the back of the book that says, "She sends English off on a great line of flight, from which it returns as poetry." I have to disagree. Poetry is supposed to make you feel something; you have your own interpretation of what the author is saying, but I got absolutely nothing from this. It isn't even pretty words, or a lyrical composition. There's no rhythm, or anything that would make me feel like this is anything other than words thrown at a page. I kept reading to see if maybe I would get used to it, and maybe the stories would make more sense, but that just never happened.

The description of this book made me think it was right up my alley, but unfortunately this is not for me at all. In the end the only thing I got from this book was a headache