Floating In A Most Peculiar Way: A Memoir

by Louis Chude-Sokei

The astonishing journey of a bright, utterly displaced boy, from the short-lived African nation of Biafra, to Jamaica, to the harshest streets of Los Angeles—a searing memoir that adds fascinating depth to the coming-to-America story The first time Chude-Sokei realizes that he is “first son of the first son” of a renowned leader of the bygone African nation is in Uncle Daddy and Big Auntie’s strict religious household in Jamaica, where he lives with other abandoned children. A visiting African has just fallen to his knees to shake him by the “Is this the boy? Is this him?” Chude-Sokei’s immersion in the politics of race and belonging across the landscape of the African diaspora takes a turn when his traumatized mother, who has her own extraordinary history as the onetime “Jackie O of Biafra,” finally sends for him to come live with her. In Inglewood, Los Angeles, on the eve of gangsta rap and the LA riots, it’s as if he’s fallen to Earth. In this world, anything alien—definitely Chude-Sokei’s secret obsession with science fiction and David Bowie—is a danger, and his yearning to become a Black American gets deeply, sometimes absurdly, complicated. Ultimately, it is a boisterous pan-African family of honorary aunts, uncles, and cousins that becomes his secret society, teaching him the redemptive skill of navigating not just Blackness, but Blacknesses , in his America.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Africa, Biography Memoir, Biography, Race, Autobiography

240 pages, Hardcover

First published February 2, 2021

Reviews

[Dawn Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read Around the World: Biafra

This memoir, is from a man who was born in Biafra, but was also a child of Jamaica and a child of the United States, all the while striving to be a "black American" so he can fit in. It is the story of his life in Jamaica, then in the United States, when he mother finally brings him to live with her, and it is a story of his search for his identity beyond being the "first son of the first son".
While I admire the author for attempting to tell this story, much of this fell flat for me. Much of the story is extremely disjointed [with multiple flashbacks to his time in Jamaica] and there were many moments where I was unsure where the author was, where he was going and what the point of the story he was at that point telling was about. It was again very disjointed and ultimately disappointing. I was hoping for more and while there were parts that were good and illuminating, ultimately, it fell flat for me and I was just glad to be done with it at the end.

Thank you to NetGalley, Louis Chude-Sokei, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Morgan · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a memoir.
It is an immigrant story from Africa to Jamaica to America - the author searching for an identity.
It is not my place to say anything negative about another person’s life experiences.
I read the book cover to cover even as I felt like giving it up several times.
I didn’t find it enlightening.
I didn’t get what the author was trying to impart to the reader.
Maybe that was my failing and nothing to do with the author.
The cover and the title are what I liked most about this book.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very powerful writing. He writes like a novelist, not an academic.

Mostly about tensions among different communities in the African diaspora--people without African heritage shouldn't assume that Africans, Caribbeans, and African-Americans feel solidarity. This isn't new or controversial--even to me--anymore, but it wasn't openly discussed (meaning, among/with white people) not all that long ago, and even now, I feel like it's more common to hear about the frustrations that African-Americans feel when discussing racism with Africans or Caribbeans. Here we get the African & Caribbean perspectives. Some specific examples: Jamaicans of different generations dislike each others' accents, and Jamaicans gently tease people from smaller islands (Nevis).

This is not at all the kind of anti-racism book that has been reaching broader (read: whiter) audiences since the summer of 2020. The author resists the kinds of binary approaches to diagnosing and fighting racism that dominate in the US. It's all much more complex. What it means to be "a Black American" changes depending on where you are and is, maybe, *the* question the book explores.

The book also explores the psychological coping skills of immigrants to the US from countries that have much more widespread poverty issues than the US does, and/or countries with recent war/other trauma. What's temporary, what's permanent, who's family, what does "ghetto" even mean? Why it's hard for different generations to discuss so many things. Vivid scenes of gatherings around someone's dining table in LA, talking about issues, maybe becoming "king of the dining table."

I absolutely loved the first half or so of the book, but I felt like the last parts were more disjointed and harder to connect to (did his mom tell him what really happened? does he have a half-sister somewhere in Nigeria? was his godfather essentially a political prisoner or a warlord, and what are we supposed to understand about his exile in comparison to others'?). I was especially fascinated by his mother's disinterest in theorizing about the terrible trauma she survived in Biafra. She didn't care about structural dynamics (colonialism, racism, predatory capitalists' interest in oil deposits); she cared only about who did the killing and who didn't, who did nothing to stop the suffering and who did everything they could no matter how small.

[Evan · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s difficult to fully comprehend some of the author’s experiences and the expectations he faced from a young age. The writing is equal parts approachable and profound. I found it important to set the book down after a chapter or two to ponder what I’d just read. Louis masterfully navigates his readers through a perplexing negotiation of identities, not the least of which is his role as the “first son of the first son” of Biafra.

[Susan Eastler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this memoir! I met Louis and his mother in LA in 1982. Louis seemed liked a typical teen at the time. As a white woman from the Northeast, he was what I thought an LA black kid would be like!
His mother and my sister-in-law worked together and had become the best of friends. The three of us spent the day together and I found Louis' mother to be a kind, gentle and beautiful woman.
I found this memoir an open and honest portrayal of a difficult upbringing, although painful at times.
The surprise to me was the bias amongst the black Americans. It has opened my eyes even wider to the struggles of immigrants and the black community.
Thank you for writing this Louis! I will recommend this book to all my reading friends and family!

[Ebirdy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book just didn't resonate with me. It got such rave reviews for it's writing and story that I was really looking forward to it.

The author didn't seem to like anyone and no one came across as having a very profound or positive influence on him. He didn't seem inspired by anyone or encouraged by anyone, other than one coach in high school whom he mentions briefly.

His depictions of Jamaicans and Nigerians were not very flattering - everyone was on the take or wanted something from him - no one seemed to provide him with anything substantive or positive. It's too bad they only saw him as someone to carry on for his father, and no one seemed to care about who he was as an individual.

I found it odd to that he never writes his father's name, nor could I find it anywhere online, despite photos of him. Only the man he is photographed with, the author's godfather, has his name printed.

His mother, the only parent he knew, seemed largely not involved in his life and other than her "word of the day or month", which he mentioned repeatedly, didn't seem to have a lot of influence on him. They seemed never able to have talked about anything of importance or about the things he wanted to know about his father etc. He mentions she is ill a couple of times and then almost in passing that she died and he went back to Nigeria to bury her. Little mention of how her death affected him or any emotions he might have felt.

The arc of the story wasn't completely linear and I had trouble at times determining what point in time the author was referencing.

It's sad that he experienced so much casual violence and sexual experiences that bordered on abuse (based on his age), both at the hands of strangers and people who should have cared about him - what a terrible way to grow up. He talks about these episodes with such a lack of emotion that it's disturbing. The descriptions of the living conditions and the awful state of the people at the hospital in Jamaica were hard to read. And again, not much of a sense of empathy for what they were suffering. He suffered such a horrible injury it's amazing he lived, but there was nothing about struggles he might of had recovering, or how long it took. Almost nothing personal again.

The part I found most interesting, because I really wasn't aware of it, was the divisions black people draw between themselves. There is a whole set of prejudices and biases based on where you are from (Jamaica, Nigeria, South Africa) or where you were educated (England, Jamaica, America) and then a whole other scale if you are a Black American. That I found interesting and sad, too.

I read memoirs because I find them great ways to learn more about someone's life and usually about the author as a person, too.

I didn't feel I knew this author any better at the end of the book than at the beginning, nor did I get a sense of his personal growth. Intellectually and academically he reached the stars, but on a human level there was such detachment and lack of emotion that I didn't feel I connected with his experiences at all.

To me a good memoir is a way to connect and understand someone's life that might be completely different from my own. This book missed that mark.

[Bookworm · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was curious to read what sounded like an epic tale of a man who was a "first son of the first son" of a bygone African nation and his travels between Jamaica, the United States, and what it's like living as a Black Man in the United States. Who fled with his mother from Gabon to Jamaica, where he was left as she made her way in the US, and then Chude-Sokei's time living in LA and NY.

It sounded really interesting but, unfortunately, it was not. I was surprised to read so many people said they couldn't put it down--I couldn't really keep up with it. It really reads more like a bunch of essays put together as a memoir, but there's no intriguing thread, with an ever-changing cast of characters that all unfortunately blend together instead of showing me the cast that brought Chude-Sokei to where he is today.

It felt very disjointed with no cohesive narrative. I'm not really sure what it was that the reader was supposed to get from what should have been a fantastic and amazing story, but I respect that this is Chude-Sokei telling. And I do think there is certainly an audience who would be very interested in his particular background and experiences of immigration and finding a new home.

That audience is definitely not me. Also warn you that while he doesn't dwell on it, there are instances of racism, xenophobia, descriptions of sexual abuse or at least questionable sexual activity.

Borrowed from the library on a whim but I'd skip this one.

[Sandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting story of a man's trying to identify as he straddles three different countries. His struggle to be an African, a Jamaican and as a Black American.

[Maven]

I always find it hard to rate someone's memoirs since they are so personal. This was a short read and illuminated a period of history I was unfamiliar with, it definitely gave some perspective to the vast perceptions of Africans, Jamaicans, and Black Americans amongst each other.

[Tiena (tlovesallthebooks) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Floating in a Most Peculiar Way was an interesting read for me - a memoir of childhood in the middle of the conflict surrounding Biafra/Nigeria Civil War - but not actually that simple. This memoir is a slow burn and it was nothing like I anticipated. Following the early chapters is a complex, multilayered personal narrative rich in both personal and political history and the story of the African diaspora - which, I admit, is a word I've not fully understood and finally learned that it simply means a scattering of people from their original homeland. This is a story not only of that scattering but also a study of trauma, family, and place.

[zumrud guluzade · Rating 3 out of 5]

*** My most favorite part was the one where he found his lost childhood song <3 I even got tears in my eyes, because it reminded me of my own lost childhood song and how i found it and how happy i was to find it (so many years i kept murmuring it, not to forget!). in fact, after reading that part, i was meeting my friend and when we entered the restaurant david bowie was on the TV singing “ground control to major tom”. a beautiful coincidence <3
Books with good covers and good titles always lure me, and i always want to know where the names come from. this one really had a nice cover and interesting title.


but when it comes to my overall review of the book:

I dont know…
I feel like some parts were beautifully written but mostly, in general, something was lacking. Was it the parts where he really couldn’t deliver what he wanted to say? Or was it his struggles in trying to find what he is looking for? For example, i didnt know that nigeria and biafra were enemies of each other. And wars lasted for many years, ending in more famine and death. That the hunger was a war strategy (terrifying!) and people were discriminated against among their own. And it felt very sad. Yet what the author wrote about his story line didnt feel genuine to me. It felt like just because he knew that he is one side jamaican the other biafran (or Igbo) and he lives in the US, it must be a curious thing.

of course, I am not saying that the author wrote this book for pr or fame or money, but in some parts where it was meeh(the degree of importance), he tried to show it as very valuable. some places were very good, rich in emotions but they would be cut randomly and there would be no moral of the story at the end. Or in some places it was like, “this time this place this moment” and in some places you wouldn’t even know how old he is, who he is with or what is happening.

I do not know. I really liked it, (or i wanted to) but somehow, it didn’t feel like a whole life story, a true experience of struggle. and neither was it really well built and structured story to me. it lacked many things.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chude-Sokei falls between establish cultural identities — born in the once Biafra, a childhood in Jamaica, then raised in both costs of the states, but primarily in LA. He navigates bewildering complexities between black immigrants, black but not Black American, Afro-Jamaicans, his family history to Biafra, his education, his homeland, and more.

[Jen K · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chude-Sokei shares his coming of age story as a memoir. Born to a Jamaican mother and a Nigerian father who met in England, he loses his father while young to the Biafran conflict of which his father was a leader. When his mom realized she was expected to marry her husband's brother as widow, she fled to a nearby refugee camp created by the conflict eventually returning home to Jamaica. However she soon emigrates to the US, leaving Louis in a Seventh Day Adventist home with other children left behind until the parent can send for them to the US.

Once he joins his mother in the US, Chude-Sokei grows up striving to fit in as an African-American while carefully be cautioned by his African and Caribbean relatives and family friends that they are black but not "that kind" of black. Trying to balance to two worlds especially as young black man in LA in the 80's with his neighborhood overrun by local gangs, its difficult to stand out and he finds ways to hide his love of learning and books.

The memoir is thoughtful from the eyes of a perpetual outsider, not quite African, not quite Caribbean and not quite African-American. I loved hearing about his visit back to Nigeria to visit his father's family and learning that history. I would be interested to hear more about his life.

[Katie Kerman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was amazing and I read it during my tiny-seated 8 hr flight next to a very nice old Danish man. It is witty, transformative, and complex-sexually, racially, and theoretically. It muddles definitions and did so with such ease.

[Jennifer Schultz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read if you: Want a unique memoir from an author who lives/has lived in African, Jamaican, and black communities.

Librarians/booksellers: This is a relatively brief but intriguing memoir; recommended.

Many thanks to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Edelweiss for a digital review copy in exchange for an honest review.

[RensBookishSpace · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a short read that illuminates a country and time period in history i was unfamiliar with, Biafran/Nigerian Civil War. It gives perspective on the differences between Africans, Jamaicans and Black Americans. How do you cope when you dont quite identify as either one? The memoir recalls the abuse he suffered in Jamaica, the anger he felt as a child towards his mother who had left him there and the confusion about his family. His father was a renowned leader of Biafra, an African nation no longer in existence. His mother had been able to escape with him as a young child from Biafra.
Read this if you enjoy memoirs, stories about the search for self identity and dont mind a non linear timeline.

[Never Without a Book]

Louis Chude-Sokei is a writer and scholar whose work ranges widely in and around the literary, political and cultural phenomena of the African Diaspora. Spanning across several continents, Chude-Sokei, recounts his search for his identity, starting with his birth place in Biafra, Africa and ending in LA. Throughout this journey, Chude-Sokei describes his feelings of alienness and isolation. 


I don’t know what it was about this memoir but I could not put it down. When reading this book Chude-Sokei, gives you more than just his story, he gives you a view of the world through the eyes of an immigrant, from the tensions between Africans and Caribbean origin when he was in Jamaica to the streets of LA where Chude-Sokei, was introduced to the “N” word and out of curiosity Chude-Sokei, asked his mother what it meant and her response  and I quote “This is very wrong and we must do something about this immediately. It is not your fault. They have mistaken you for one of the blacks. Do you get? It is because we look the same. When someone says that word to you or calls you that name, say this. Listen. And you must say it very well and clear. Say I am not a slave.” my jaw dropped, an eye-opening moment.


Here's a fun fact, growing up Chude-Sokei adored David Bowie’s music, so the title of each chapter references lyrics from Bowie’s music.


Honestly this memoir was such a joy to read, engaging and insightful, I can easily say this will be one of my favorites of the year. Thank you, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, for this gifted copy.

[Gerry Durisin · Rating 4 out of 5]

4-1/2 stars. Those of us who came of age in the 1960s and 1970s will recall the horrifying photography of starving Biafran children, their bellies swollen grotesquely, their bones barely covered by a thin layer of skin. Louis Chude-Sokei might have been one of those children, but was able to escape Biafra with his mother as a young child. She fled with him to Gabon, and then to Jamaica, where she left him to be cared for for several years while she made her way to America, before eventually bringing him to live with her in NYC and later in LA. Floating in a Most Peculiar Way is Chude-Sokei's memoir of growing up in America, and finding his identity: not completely African, not completely Jamaican, not quite African-American as that culture was understood at the time. Very well written, the memoir recalls the abuse he suffered in Jamaica, the anger he felt as a ten-year-old child toward the mother who had left him there, his confusion about his family (especially his father, one of the leaders of the Biafran independence movement) in Africa, and his struggles as a young man to find his place in this new land. Louis Chude-Sokei is now a writer and scholar at Boston University; his work ranges widely in and around the literary, political and cultural phenomena of the African Diaspora.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the free ebook download in exchange for an objective review.

[Britt.and.Lit Book Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Louis Chude-Sokei’s childhood seems like something out of a ballad in itself. His father was key in trying to defend the small Republic of Biafra in the Nigerian Civil War. His father was killed and Biafra fell. His mother fled to Jamaica to have her son be raised by relatives, while she tried to earn money in America. He eventually ends up in Inglewood in Los Angelos, where he has difficulty navigating beyond the barriers of racism and resist becoming a part of the many gangs in his area. The most compelling part of his story I found in his returning to his home country and discovering more about his famous father. He is the “First Son of the First Son” and is lauded as a Prince among the people who share memories of his father with him. Now to the Bowie stuff. When I saw this book featured in the NYT Book Review- I immediately became so excited about its title that I bought it within minutes. Louis Chude-Sokei’s description of the 1st time he heard Space Oddity was similar to the feelings I had hearing it as a kid. The kind of immediate drive to figure out who this artist is and find any way possible to hear the song in its entirety. Even if you aren’t Bowie-obsessed, this writer and his story are incredible. A must-read for 2021.

[Alyssa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I gravitated toward this book for the beautiful cover, the David Bowie lyric reference in the title, and because I can rarely resist a story centered around the African diaspora.

"There was so much to understand but even more to prove."

Louis Chude-Sokei's memoir is a transnational coming of age story starting in the war-torn former nation Biafra, finding temporary refuge in Jamaica, and landing in America. In his straightforward writing, Chude-Sokei touches on identity, diaspora, foreignness, and race. He examines the "in-betweenness" of Black immigrants' lives and the "tensions within Blackness itself" in America. I could not put this book down and was not ready for it to end. I'll be looking for more of Chude-Soke's writing in the future.

I received a free digital review copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[LyddieReads · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very personal look into one young boys journey of finding his place in a world that seems to want him to conform into one particular type of Black man. A memoir that provokes deep thought on the subject of racism outside the usual white vs black by delving into the African diaspora from a singularly personal experience of being caught between Jamaica and Africa while trying to find belonging in America.

[Smileitsjoy (JoyMelody) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautifully written. Poetic even. But extremely slow. Felt disjointed. Maybe it wasn’t for me.
I would still recommend
His writing really is something. Have quite a few tabs with annotated comments. Learned a lot. Just wasn’t a smooth read.

[Liam Whitworth · Rating 5 out of 5]

A complex, layered, nuanced discussion of race and identity.

[Heather Vickery · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautifully written book that provided me with education and knowledge of things I’ve had no previous experience with.

[La La · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book, oh this book...

First of all the author cannot understand why the struggles of African Americans (those who have family histories of slavery in the US) are viewed separately and in a way, as the author defined it, "held sacred" in the fight against racism in the US. Well, it's because their ancestors were brought here against their will in shackles, stripped of their cultures, and not only were many treated horrifically in the bonds of American slavery, their ancestors were never able to benefit from the economy that was built on the backs of those in slavery. Even after slavery ended in the US, generations of Black Americans have been held at arms length from the American Dream through systemic racism. I, as a White woman, understand this... how can this Black immigrant not understand?

The first point of the book was about how Jamaican immigrants feel they are superior to African Americans because they were never slaves. Well, if he's going to go that route, they most likely were slaves, only by British oppression, not American. When the author was called the N-word at school he and his cousins were instructed to tell people they weren't the N-word because their fathers and grandfathers were never slaves. In the '70s and '80s American students' fathers and grandfathers weren't slaves either. Slavery in Jamaica ended around the same time as slavery in the US. The author said the Jamaican community in the L.A. area would get together every Saturday night to discuss and debate the different levels of Blackness in the US. How does making a hierarchy of Blackness help the fight against racism? Is this true about Jamaicans?

What I don't understand about the author is with all of his complaints about the US, why does he not travel back to live in his mother's beloved country of Jamaica, or his father's worshipped country of Nigeria where he has family in both places. The author kept talking about how his father's family in Nigeria is seen as a type of "royalty" and he loves the vibrant culture there.

He feels the fight against racism for African Americans in the US should be blended into the fight against general racism suffered by Black people in the US. That their history of being enslaved and then suffering generations of segregation and less civil rights has no bearing on what he calls "Blackness". He was angry when both his Black and White college professors wouldn't accept this ideation. I don't see how he doesn't get it.

And then there was the whole thing about the author wanting to be the "Black King" of Los Angeles. He has an obsession with royal regalia and ceremony. When his Godfather from Nigeria was visiting in L.A, and they had a dinner with many attendees dressed in ceremonial garb and he and his mother were sitting beside his "royal" Godfather at the head table being waited on like royalty, his Godfather said the scenario was his pan-African dream. Hmm...

I read this for Carib-A-Thon and Caribbean American Heritage Month, but it didn't paint a very good picture of Jamaicans in the US. I hope this is a misrepresentation by a narcissistic author.

*As an afterthought I want to add that the author thought (thinks) the Black American culture in the L.A. area (if his representation of Black culture in L.A. is truthful) was the same for Black Americans across the entire country. Does he realize how large the US is? He said listening to Reggae music and reading Sci-Fi was seen as acting White by Black Americans. However, I know from personal experience that it wasn't in the Northeast. He only mentioned Rap and Hip-Hop being acceptable to listen to... didn't he know about Blues and Jazz artists and Black/Black-fronted rock bands (even some Metal and Punk bands). And Sci-Fi? What about Afrofuturism and Black Science Fiction writer Octavia E. Butler?

[Tammy V · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this from the library thinking it was a novel (ok, I can't read - the front of the book notes "memoir"). Had I noted "memoir" I probably wouldn't haven gotten it because I generally don't like memoirs. I'm glad I missed it. I totally enjoyed this read. It gave me history I knew but didn't know, and a look into actual life behind some of the fiction I have recently read. It is always interesting to see what one picks to tell one's story, and while we the reader can't tell what was left out, I read it knowing that some things must have been.

I have quibbles with the format, especially toward the end when I got lost in time and place, but I just kept reading and let it go. I felt like his trip back home to "his village" got short shift - I would have liked more of that along the lines of his LA and Jamaican experiences. Maybe it seemed as rushed and unreal to him as it did to me. Maybe it was harder to parse and therefore was one of the things left out. Perhaps it would have been stronger in essay format.

Excerpts:
Acting white, thn had nothing to do with whit people or their skin. Learning this was a true revelation. Acting white had to do with how those who read spoke and how they began to react to the people and world around them. It defined a curiosity seen as dangerous because it mean you were testing this community's definitions and limits This curiosity had to be policed, it seemed to me, because it threatened those definitions and limits by suggesting they could be transformed.
What seemed especially strange, given what I knew from being born on the African continent and having spent years on a majority-black island, was that Blackness had nothing to do with where we came from. At least not in this neighborhood. We immigrants certainly weren't Black - we were told so regularly by our neighbors and friends who were, apparently, *really* Black. If whiteness wasn't really about skin, neither was Blackness.

**
'Alienation, cultural confusion, those things I know are great concerns these days. I've read the books. But truly they were foreign to us. We were not racked with doubt. We'd been colonized, but we were not confused. Or we wouldn't have fought at all! Perhaps you could say that things were clearer then. It's a sad thing that those things matter so much now. I wonder if it's really regret, not ours but of those who write about us. Because we had none.' [his godfather speaking]

**
As an immigrant, I recognized exquisitely by now the limitations of race in the country I had grown up in. But this was the country where I'd formed the questions that had led me between and among dialects, cultures, and communities; and despite its own limitations, the academic world still seemed the best place to continue asking them... my dissertation topic, which drew harsh criticism an rejection by the few African American professors in my department and by white professors afraid to contradict them....angered by my desire to study the histories and outcomes of Black immigrants in this country, particularly as they differed from those of African Americans.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not know what I was getting into, but this was fascinating, and so much better than a celebrity memoir. He is the son of the leader of the failed secessionist African state of Biafra, who spent time in Jamaica (his mother’s home) and then moved to the United States (“land of opportunity”). Chude-Sokei sits atop the tripod of West African, Carrbbean, and America experience, being able to move among all three but finding no place permanent to settle and find a sense of belonging, at least not while growing up. As African/Caribbean immigrant, he had the mantra of, “We came here by choice,” in contrast to the descendants of Black Americans who were en slaves and brought to the Americas by force.

Moving to LA, Chude-Sokei was mis/read as Black, when he was more Caribbean or African. He did not feel himself to be Black the same way that the descendants of formerly enclaves Africans are black. And yet, in Jamaica he took on the “Black American” persona in order to be tough and cool.

What interesting commentary on race, class, immigration, and all sorts of variations of the Black experience. He had a tension between assimilation and ties to his roots and also being nationless (as Biafra was a failed, short-lived west African state). He learned that race is less important than class, but skin color is a shorthand for class in America. And that for Black Americans who have grown up Black in America, or at least while he was getting a graduate degree at his university, there is the main dynamic of black/white, and a lot less interest in the experience of Blackness in diaspora in all its forms (eg, like his experience coming to America in the second half of the 20th century). I found his meditations to be thoughtful, thorough, and insightful (though this is also one of few books about African diaspora that I have read recently, so I’m unsure how it compares.)

“This was the dream: Africa, the Middle Passage, and America, all sitting down together at the dining table. Pan-Africa.”

“Americans feel are dramatic about their suffering and let everyone know they’re suffering.”

[Magaly C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This memoir follows the journey--both physical and emotional--of "the first son of the first son" Louis Chude-Sokei. His mother, having fled Biafra after the murder of her husband, takes her son to Jamaica and then immigrates to the U.S. The memoir follows Chude-Sokei's life in Jamaica, growing up surrounded by aunties and cousins and without his mother. Then, in middle school, he arrives to Washington D.C. and is re-introduced to the reality of his mother contrasted with the way she was spoken about as the "Jackie O of Biafra." After some time and hardships in D.C. he and his mother then move to Los Angeles in the wake of riots and police racism. From there, Chude-Sokei explores and explains the differences in identity of being a Black American and an immigrant from an extinct country by way of Jamaica. African immigrants and Black Americans have a contrasting experience by the very essence of choice--choosing to come to the United States.

Immigrant narratives and journey of identity are so important in understanding the nuances of the diverse immigrant experiences. Chude-Sokei has had a life filled with complicated relationships with people, sexual experiences that border on abuse (tw, for sure, I was not ready), and the struggle to yearn for his unknown father (or any positive male presence) whose legacy follows him yet, in his youth, he is unable to speak to his mother about him or this yearning.

The pacing is quick and filled with the author's stories in a way that may seem disjointed. However, like memory, one recalls the impactful moments of one's life, which is highlighted in this memoir. I don't see the point of memoirs as revealing a great "a-ha" or revelation of life, but rather the story of how you came to be at a certain point: the legacy you leave in which you were able to take the reigns of the narrative. Therefore, I found this to be important in highlighting the range of immigrant experiences and the struggle of being Black in America, African in America, displaced in America and the African diaspora.

[Millie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deeply moving, down to the last line of the Acknowledgements.
There is still so much to learn about the African and African American diaspora, this book provides some insight.
"The astonishing journey of a bright, utterly displaced boy, from the short-lived African nation of Biafra, to Jamaica, to the harshest streets of Los Angeles—a searing memoir that adds fascinating depth to the coming-to-America story"
BUT MORE about him, damn he's prolific! Yay for the opportunity to learn more
From Boston University's site
"Professor Of English, George And Joyce Wein Chair In African American & Black Diaspora Studies, Director Of The African American & Black Diaspora Studies Program
Louis Chude-Sokei is a writer and scholar whose books includes The Last Darky: Bert Williams, Black on Black Minstrelsy and the African Diaspora (Duke University Press, 2006, finalist for both the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award and the George Freedley Award), The Sound of Culture: Diaspora and Black Technopoetics (Wesleyan University Press, 2016) and the acclaimed memoir, Floating in A Most Peculiar Way (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021). His public and literary writing has appeared in various national and international venues including, The LA Times, The New York Times, The Seattle Times, and The San Francisco Chronicle, to The Believer, The Chicago Quarterly, South Africa’s Chimurenga Chronic and The Daily Gleaner in Jamaica. His work has been translated into multiple languages, including Hungarian, German, Spanish, Italian and Korean. He is the Editor in Chief of The Black Scholar, one of the oldest and leading journals of Black Studies in the United States."
from https://www.bu.edu/afam/profile/louis...

[O · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't know what to make of this memoir. It's honest and raw and complex, which makes it brilliant. I think this is going to go over the heads of people who are not of the African Diaspora, because the themes the author talks about here are so specific to us, that I think the nuances will be missed by others.
I'm still processing my thoughts, so I may be back to revise my review, but here's what I'm thinking so far:

1. Louis Chude-Sokei is the living embodiment of the Diaspora-a Nigerian Jamaican who is also an American. He's of all these worlds and at the same time belongs to none, because none of the regions accept him fully. This brings me to my next point-

2. The tensions between the members of the Diaspora are deep and ugly. From what I can surmise, Black Americans and Caribbean people have a serious disdain for Africans, Africans and Caribbeans have a serious disdain for Black Americans, and the Caribbeans are sort of in the middle. There is no evidence of outright disdain from Black Americans or Africans for them, but there isn't a love, either. Louis's life and body paid the price for these tensions.

3. Sexual molestation is so rampant in childhood. I was horrified at how blithely Louis talked about the NUMEROUS ways he had been sexually abused, to the point where I wondered if he's actually fully processed what has happened to him.

I'm still working through my feelings, but I'm going to recommend this book to everyone of the Diaspora. There are some important concepts in his memoir that have to be discussed openly and honestly. I thank him for writing this.