Review: "Nigeria Jones" by Ibi Zoboi

Nigeria Jones by Ibi Zoboi
Published May 2023 via Balzer + Bray
★★★★

Nigeria Jones has been raised to be a warrior, a revolutionary, a queen. Her father has dedicated his life to the Movement, and he wants Nigeria by his side as he dismantles white supremacy and forms a new, Black nation. This is the only world Nigeria knows, and until recently it's been the only world she wanted to know. But being in the fight day in and day out is exhausting, and the rest of the city, the state, the country—even with its racism and its injustices, even with white-majority spaces and white privilege—is calling.

Nigeria's story is complicated by the fact that her mother is no longer here, no longer in the Movement. She'd been all in for most of Nigeria's life, but her version of freedom was different than that of her husband, with different dreams: Nigeria in top institutions, with the option to break barriers from within as well as without. (Choices. A lot of the book comes down to choices.) And Nigeria is waiting desperately for her mother to return, but in the meantime she's adrift, with more responsibilities and questions than ever.

Zoboi paints such a nuanced picture here. There's so much that Nigeria wants to be and do—but she's not sure how much of it is available to her, both because the country's institutions were built for white people and because her father is so adamant that she have nothing to do with those institutions. But her father is not the villain, and nor should he be: he is a radical, outspoken in ways that make people uncomfortable, and he is truly doing what he believes is best for his people generally and Nigeria specifically. I love that there are so few character-villains here—there are characters who do not stand up when they should, and there are characters who stand up too loudly, and there are characters who make choices or comments rooted in ignorance. There isn't any one person to vanquish over the course of the book, though, and the book is far richer for it—it's not like systemic racism and oppression can be overcome by taking down one character, after all. To that end, I also love how conflicted Nigeria is: she wants some of the things her father has railed against, like education in an excellent but primarily white school, but she is also too much her father's daughter to accept such an environment easily, or to discard the truths that she know. Hers is not a story of discarding one belief system for another but of starting the process of interrogating her beliefs and truths and figuring out for herself what holds up.

There's a reveal near the end (keeping it vague to avoid spoilers!) that I'm not particularly keen on—I could see it coming from some distance away, but as a matter of personal preference I tend to prefer that sort of material to be worked in (and worked through) over the course of a book rather than held back from the reader. No matter how well it is done, I always read it as a bit gimmicky. That said—it is very well done here, and heart-wrenching to boot.

Here's hoping that this book makes it into many, many libraries and teenagers' bookshelves.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.