Aquarian Dawn by Ebele Chizea

Abstract

Reviewed by: Aquarian Dawn by Ebele Chizea Wesley Jacques Chizea, Ebele Aquarian Dawn. Three Rooms Press, 2022 [224p] Paper ed. ISBN 9781953103253 $15.00 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 8-12 When a teenaged Ada Ekene and her mother arrive in Greensberg, PA, in January 1966, their newly independent Afrikan homeland Nabuka is on the verge of civil war. Conflict between mother and daughter tends to run just as deep and cold in the frigid winter, even as the two women work on building a new life in smalltown U.S. Ada’s stepdad Ben is recently divorced from her mother but still plays a key role in Ada’s life, maintaining her connection to post-colonial Nabuka and her Afa ethnic heritage. Ada’s mother is distant, stern, and has high expectations for her secretly chainsmoking daughter, who has only excelled in school because it’s easier than having actual conversations with her mother. The tragic toll of the war back home and its immediate impacts on Ada’s family add geo-political underpinnings to this truly unique coming-of-age story, where small-town high school anxieties of the ’60s develop into wide-scale young adult uneasiness in the ’70s. The loosely concealed real-world countries, towns, and institutions keep this world fictionalized but familiar and underscores how personal the political can be. Chizea offers YA fiction a provocative maturity and thoughtful nuance that reads like Zadie Smith or Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie but nonetheless provides an undoubted and necessary perspective specifically for young audiences. Copyright © 2022 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois