Lola, the likeable and resilient protagonist in Bisi Adjapon's Daughter in Exile, finds herself in multiple difficult situations over a matter of years. At one point, pregnant without a partner after her husband dies, she is left to manage a toddler, her grief and an unborn daughter.

An active member of a parish community, Lola looks to her church to give her the strength to continue. It is there that she is slipped tapes of the American evangelical psychologist Dr. James Dobson arguing that it is better for children to be raised by two parents. Fellow parishioners send Lola messages urging her to not be selfish and give her child a "good home." Guilt coupled with self-loathing gives her the motivation to agree to adoption, and the church finds a childless couple interested in adopting baby Kemi, Tilly and Pierce Livingston. Lola is adamant that the adoption be an open one. She wants updates, photographs and communication. But after she relinquishes her baby she frets: "I kept ...