We Need New Names

by NoViolet Bulawayo

This is the story of a girl from Zimbabwe.  The book starts with her young life in the country as she and her friends roam outside their neighbourhood to steal fruit on the trees, they are very hungry.  The kids, despite their hunger, have some very creating games, Find Bin Laden, Country Game, etc.  The all have unusual names.  The main character is Darling and some of her friends include Bastard, Godknows, Jesus, etc.  One of the girls, Chico, who is 10, the same age as Darling, is pregnant by her grandfather.  The book can be graphic and brutal at times.  At one point the children decide that Chico's belly is impairing her ability to play their games so they try to make the baby come out of her stomache.  They are stopped before they hurt her.

Darlings father is away in South Africa trying to find work.We learn that the children used to have homes, and go to school but some fighters came and destroyed their homes and communities. This is why they are not going to school now and why they live in tin huts.

One day the children witness some blacks attacking a white house.  They trash the house, and take away the owners.  The children take this opportunity to eat the food in the house.

Darling's father returns, very ill, probably with Aids, and dies.  Darling had been dreaming of going to America as she has an Aunt there who would take her in.  She gets the opportunity to go to America and jumps at it.  She misses her mother and friends but not enough to want to go back.  When she gets to the States she is shocked by winter and how cold it is.

She does ask to go back to Zimbabwe for a visit but she can't because she is really an illegal alien.  She came on a student visa but started working to send money back to her family and we find out that many immigrants are in the same boat.  They think they are coming to America for "the good life" but instead they are working many low pay jobs, partly to send money back home, they have to hide from the authorities and if they get sick they don't have access to medical care. Her aunt is constantly dieting and exercising so she will be skinny like the women on TV and in the magazines.  The uncle initially watches sports on TV all the time but when his son volunteers for the military he becomes fixated on war stories and news.  He starts wandering around in his car.

The family in Africa think she is living a good life in America, they want her to come to visit and she tells them she will but she can't tell them the truth, that if she went back she couldn't get back in to the U.S.  As the book ends she is trying to save money to go to university and get a career but she also misses her mother country.  She misses or feels disjointed because she can't use her mother tongue.   One day she starts writing phrases on the wall in her bedroom.

The book was very graphic and brutal at times.  It does a great job of portraying the despair but also the remarkable resilience of the people in Africa.  It also portrays the sad plight of the illegal immigrants.  I found the book book more sad and upsetting than engaging.

A few years ago I read the book Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai.  It takes place near the Himalayas and part of the story is about a man who dearly would like to have his son back with him but he thinks his son is having a successful life in America, so he doesn't urge him to return.  The son would love to return home but he thinks his father is proud of him and he doesn't want to admit that he is only eking out an existence.  He is working in low paying jobs and is essentially homeless., sleeping in empty buildings.  I found the Desai book a lot more compelling than this one. You really felt for and cared about the characters in her book.  I wasn't really engaged with the characters in Bulawayo's book --- it was a story and things happened but I didn't care about them as much.  Maybe I am getting desensitized to these tales with so much tragedy in the world these days.