It seems I waited a long time for Chimananda Ngozi Adichie's latest book, Dream Count. It was definitely worth waiting for. I am a big fan of her writing, and especially her characters. This novel is about female friends, their daily lives and adventures, and I became friends with all of them. I thought of Chiamaka (Chia) as the author personified! I had a love/hate relationship with Omelogor and her Robin Hood project. My heart went out to Kadiatou and the injustice she suffered. Ms Adichie's writing evokes such emotions in me that I miss her characters after I finish the book. I hope her next novel isnt so many years off!!!

The world has changed significantly since 2013, when Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie wrote Americanah, her breathtaking mosaic on all-things-racial. And we, who are now mired in false outrage and dissatisfaction, have changed with it.

In her afterward, the author says that “stories die and recede from collective memory mostly for not being told.” We must clearly and consistently see, interpret, and question the world. We must also look back on how we lived and identify what endures.

Some things will always remain: the hunger for enduring friendship and family connections, the mentality of scarcity even if we have enough, the struggle to reinvent ourselves, better understand our values and culture, and define ourselves as women (particularly Black women without that all-important MAN to give us societal respect.

Here we have four women: Chiamaka, a Nigerian travel writer who lives in America. She constantly adds to her body count – she calls them her dream count – of men who ultimately fall short of what she’s looking for. Her best friend Zikora, a lawyer, is similarly unlucky in the men she trusts. Omegolor, Chiamaka’s cousin, plays by man’s rules, and as a result, is wildly successful, and emotionally shut off. And then there is Kadiatou, who keeps house for Chiamaka and whose life is, in many ways, the emotional foundation of this novel.

It is tempting to try to surmise which of these characters is the pivot for all that happens. Does Adichie intend it to be the one whose tale opens and closes the book (the only character who is given two sections)? Is it the one who is the apparent spokeswoman for the current culture in Nigeria (not unlike Ifemelu in Americanah, who blogged articles such as “To My Fellow Non-American Blacks: In America, You Are Black, Baby, Omegolor pens a blog that begins “Dear Men” and tutors men on how to better understand their role). Is it the one who Adichie reveals, in her afterword, translates her own grief? Or is it Kadiatou, who grips the reader with the unfairness of life? I have my opinion, and I’ll leave it to others to decide. But I believe all four narratives are dependent on each other for the full scope to emerge.

The novel asks why we remember what we remember, and which reels from our past truly assert their vivid selves. As in her past works, Dream Count tackles what matters: our cultural, gender, socioeconomic, and racial divides, and the difficulty of maintaining our power when men set the rules. This novel – Adichie’s first in a decade – was well worth waiting for, and I thank Knopf and NetGalley for the privilege of being an early reviewer in exchange for an honest review.

The author has made some comments about trans women that are absolutely atrocious and I will not be supporting this book or the author.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s writing is incredible. To have a new novel from her is a gift. In her latest, she once again sculpts fascinating, complicated, human characters and spins stories that will keep you turning the pages to read more.

The four African women (living in the US and Africa) in the book receive their own sections. They're all interesting, and the story speaks very much to the current state of the word. Ultimately, the threads of these four characters don’t weave together into a single profound moment, and for that, it lacks the punch of Americanah, an all-time favorite novel of mine. It seems here that the writer has a number of different ideas she wants to discuss, but the book is left more fragmented than I would like.

The tone is dark, with a tiny sliver of light at the very end of the tunnel. For those concerned about triggers, much of the book references the COVID pandemic, and there are also multiple sexual assaults, female genital mutilation, and other topics that may be sensitive to some.

This was an excellent book!! I enjoyed the character development as well as how the plot was developed throughout the story. The author was able to to do a good job with all aspects of the story. I would recommend to others.

DREAM COUNT is centered around five women who are interconnected through one of them. It focuses on the experiences and challenges these women go through that involve complexities of relationships and the female experience. I really liked the premise but found myself not as engaged with it as I was when reading the author's Americanah (highly recommend!), but if you like the slower paced, dense fiction that doesn't feel like fiction, this may be suited for you.

3.5 stars rounded to 4.

Thank you to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor and NetGalley for the arc in exchange for my honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this novel. I just had a hard time staying interested. More of a character study with little plot to speak of, which made it hard to get through.

Talk about anticlimactic. This book started so strong — the writing, the interwoven stories, the inner dialogues, the friendships — and then completely petered out. What started as a story about relationships (both platonic and romantic) that centered a bold cast of women characters petered out into a catalogue (a “dream count”) of unfulfilling exploits and what-ifs that centered men.

At first, it reminded me of the elegant way Adichie elucidates cultural nuance that I loved so much in Americanah: “I felt tight with discomfort. This conversation would be normal at a dinner in Lagos or Abuja, and everyone would talk like Omelogor, bold and baroque declarations topping one another. But here her words bruised the air. She didn’t know how to wear different selves like I did… American English was spoken at a higher pitch than normal, and she wondered if she would ever perfect that pitch, even if she managed to get the words right.”

And her way of artfully capturing inner monologues, self truths and relationships:

“Finally, as she opened the door, she tripped and nearly fell, catching herself, stumbling. The room had spit her out. She was now so worthless as to repel even a storage room. She felt hemmed in by shame, shame forced upon the innocent, glowing in unfairness.”

This colorful writing continues, but the story arc doesn’t keep pace. Ultimately, Chia, Zikora and Kadi’s narratives peaked to a crescendo, and then all the threads seemed to get lost, flap in the breeze.

This is a very long book so a lot of my students will be put off by that, but for the ones that are willing to read it, I think they will get a lot out of it. The story of 4 Nigerian woman, their struggles, their relationships with men, often painful and their relationships with each other.. It is very well written and a glimpse into a different world for most of my students. the characters are relatable, despite the different cultures, ages and financial situations.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for this advance readers copy, in exchange for an honest review. This was my first read from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and it won’t be my last! This book was a unique character study on five women, all interconnected in some way and with stories overlapping throughout each of their individual sections.

Each women is given her own section of text, a rather lengthy chapter, and within each, complex topics and relationships are thoroughly evaluated; many questions are raised, sometimes with no answers provided, which left me deep in thought and interested in reading on. For instance, the complex, confusing emotions related to the concept of home, the immigrant experience, privilege was a undercurrent that I felt ran through most stories and I think this is where we see the author’s writing shine (along with her commentary on the female experience, motherhood, etc.— so much here to unpack!). I enjoyed the way that events sometimes overlapped between sections and appreciated the different perspectives that we got to see from the individual women in this way.

I do think that my reading experience would have benefitted from shorter chapters; there were times when it felt like work to read through each woman’s chapter, with no break in sight. However, I think there is a lot in this book to appreciate and am sure that it will resonate with many. Overall, I would recommend this book to literary and women’s fiction fans!

I found this book quite interesting. The subject matter was different and I was pulled in from the beginning. The author’s writing is beautiful. Very descriptive and thoughtful and provoking. I highlighted heavily.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review****

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an advance copy of this title in exchange for honest feedback

Beautiful writing,
fascinating characters,
powerful stories.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️


I write haiku reviews but am happy to provide more feedback.

This was my first read by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. One of the most wonderful storytellers I have come across. Learning more about her characters was incredible. I will definitely be looking into the author’s other works. Best read of the year by far.

Another excellent book from Adichie! Told from the perspectives of four women, it covers their lives, their loves, their families, their hopes, their disappointments, their dreams.

Four single Nigerian women--connected to one another. Chiamaka [Chia] , a travel writer [of a different sort]--living in the US. Zikora, Chiamaka's best friend, a lawyer. Omelogor, Chiamaka's cousin, a banker. Kadiatou [Kadi, the only non-privileged woman], who immigrates to the US to become Chiamaka's housekeeper. Kadi is raped by a powerful man in a hotel where she has a second job as a cleaner; this part of the narrative ultimately involves the other women and the Author's Note is a must read.

The books are chapters in each woman's voice but they are interwoven as the stories overlap and flow into the other sections.

Friendships--mostly between the women, but some with men. Failed relationships [with men] abound. Hopes and dreams and regrets. The coronavirus--when will it come to Nigeria? How will the country [be able to] handle it? What will it mean? How does it affect the protaganists in Nigeria and the US? And, with Chia, one gets the perspective of how a Nigerian views America/American culture.

I quite enjoyed this book but found it uneven, Some parts I sped through, others were more of a slog.

I love a book that's well written and offers a glimpse into another culture; this fits the bill. There is much on the Nigerian upper class which I found quite revealing. My favorite part--Omelgor's work in the Nigerian bank--so vivid!

The writing and many descriptions--images and understanding/s jumped off the pages. Prose that struck me. To wit:
"suburban silence"
"mind furred in gloom"
"...the calibrated charm of a person who can turn fully nasty in a heartbeat"
"we inherit our parents' scars more often than we know"
"Some surfaces I prefer to leave alone because I fear what I will find underneath."
"his laughter was a rain of darts aimed at his brother"

I LOVED Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun--one of my favorites--read if you haven't!

And: NB: a Glossary would have been extremely helpful--perhaps when released as a paperback!

An Amazing journey through the lives of four women and is told through each women perspective and intertwine into one emotional story. We have Chia that’s a travel writer looking for love, Zikora a lawyer with hopes of a family, Omelogor a banker that has done some shady/illegal business, and Kadiotou a housekeeper that has come to America to be with someone she loves and to give her daughter a better life.

This book will not disappoint, it is an emotional roller coaster and will take you around the world.

This is a brilliant story of four strong, brave women. Their combined experiences
show their true courage and grift, their refusal to fail, their refusal to accept the
world in which they were born. I was immediately pulled completely into this
booked, slowing my reading as I was so engrossed in concomitant thoughts
I was forgetting to turn the page. Reading this brilliant, well crafted story
I was reminded about the other books I have read by this gifted Author and
I believe it’s a true privilege to become a part of the world as others see and
experience life. We are reminded that we really are very much the same.
Please do not miss out on this book.
My thanks to Alfred a Knopf Inc via NetGalley for the download copy’
of this book for review purposes.

This book did not keep me as engaged as I expected based on Adichie’s other books, but I enjoyed learning about the characters’ lives and thought there were a lot of interesting plot points. I was not the biggest fan of the switching perspectives, especially given the long chapters - it felt like 4 different books in a way. Also, COVID is not nearly as important to the plot as it seems from the summary - COVID doesn’t happen until the end of the book. But overall, a good novel and I am glad to get the opportunity to read it.

The story is of four women and how it weaves their relationships into each other. The themes are love, loss, heartache, motherhood and loneliness and how their culture can define them. The story unfolds in the early beginnings of the pandemic but Covid is not a central part of the story.

Chia is the travel writer who binds everyone together. During her lockdown from Covid,she examines her life and what she thought and dreamed it would have been. Omelogor is her cousin who is a high profile banker in Nigeria.
Zikora is Chia’s friend who is a lawyer and single mother. Kadiatou is Chia’s Guinean immigrant housekeeper who has a tragic event happen to her. All the women come together to help Kadiatou.

Adichie does a wonderful job with the women and their culture and stories. My favorite was Kadiatou and Chia.
Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf for the arc.