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Published Jan 2022
384 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
Meet Yinka: a thirty-something, Oxford-educated, British Nigerian woman with a well-paid job, good friends, and a mother whose constant refrain is "Yinka, where is your huzband?"
Yinka's Nigerian aunties frequently pray for her delivery from singledom, her work friends think she's too traditional (she's saving herself for marriage!), her girlfriends think she needs to get over her ex already, and the men in her life…well, that's a whole other story. But Yinka herself has always believed that true love will find her when the time is right.
Still, when her cousin gets engaged, Yinka commences Operation Find-A-Date for Rachel's Wedding. Aided by a spreadsheet and her best friend, Yinka is determined to succeed. Will Yinka find herself a huzband? And what if the thing she really needs to find is herself?
Yinka, Where is Your Huzband? brilliantly subverts the traditional romantic comedy with an unconventional heroine who bravely asks the questions we all have about love. Wry, acerbic, moving, this is a love story that makes you smile but also makes you think--and explores what it means to find your way between two cultures, both of which are yours.
"Blackburn's comical debut chronicles a Nigerian British woman's quest to find a date for her cousin's wedding...[her] lighthearted tone helps deliver heavy thoughts on colorism, the tension of cultural differences, and the benefits of therapy, as the story moves toward a happy ending on all fronts. This delivers loads of entertainment and a dollop of enlightenment." - Publishers Weekly
"A liberal salting of patois...firmly root this novel in a community depicted with warmth and humor. A sassy, spirited story." - Kirkus Reviews
"Blackburn's debut is a laugh-out-loud story of self-discovery, set against the world of contemporary dating. Yinka cleverly navigates others' competing expectations of who she should be, figuring out who she is in the process. Fans of Uzma Jalaluddin and Sonya Lalli will delight in this story of a one of a kind woman learning how to love one of the most important people in her life: herself." - Booklist
"Lizzie Damilola Blackburn's debut novel is incredibly relatable for anybody whose family members frequently question their relationship status. In Yinka, Where Is Your Huzband? a thirty-something Nigerian woman attempts to find herself a wedding date and learns some valuable lessons about life and love." - Marie Claire
"So modern and fresh. Like Bridget Jones, Yinka is a lovable and relatable disaster—which is to say, she isn't actually a disaster at all...I adore her." - Emily Henry, #1 New York Times bestselling author of People We Meet on Vacation
"Beautifully observed, warm and deeply human, Yinka, Where Is Your Huzband? is a meditation on family and friendship, on love and self-love. Feel-good, funny and clever, it's got smash-hit written all over it!" - Josie Silver, New York Times bestselling author of One Day in December
"Yinka, Where Is Your Huzband? is a beautiful, big hearted story about friendship, family, and love. Yinka's charming voice draws you in and her journey toward self-acceptance will make you stay. A fun and relatable read." - Emiko Jean, New York Times bestselling author
This information about Yinka, Where Is Your Huzband? was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Lizzie Damilola Blackburn, born and raised in London, is a British-Nigerian writer who has been at the receiving end of the question in the title of her debut novel many times, and now lives with her husband in Milton Keynes, England.
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