“Powerfully magnetic. . . . In the lineage of great works by Chinua Achebe and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. . . . A thoroughly contemporary—and deeply moving—portrait of a marriage.” —The New York Times Book Review Ilesa, Nigeria. Ever since they first met and fell in love at university, Yejide and Akin have agreed: polygamy is not for them. But four years into their marriage—after consulting … marriage—after consulting fertility doctors and healers, and trying strange teas and unlikely cures—Yejide is still not pregnant. She assumes she still has time—until her in-laws arrive on her doorstep with a young woman they introduce as Akin’s second wife. Furious, shocked, and livid with jealousy, Yejide knows the only way to save her marriage is to get pregnant. Which, finally, she does—but at a cost far greater than she could have dared to imagine.
The unforgettable story of a marriage as seen through the eyes of both husband and wife, Stay With Me asks how much we can sacrifice for the sake of family.
A New York Times Notable Book
One of the Best Books of the Year: NPR, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Chicago Tribune, BuzzFeed, Entertainment Weekly, The New York Post, Southern Living, The Skimm
A 2017 BEA Buzz Panel Selection
A Belletrist Book-of-the-Month
A Sarah Jessica Parker Book Club Selection
Shortlisted for the 2017 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction
Shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize and the 9mobile Prize for Literature
Longlisted for the International Dylan Thomas Prize
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It was hard to get into ln fact I put it down twice but the third time I finally got wholly involved in it. It was different but on the whole I enjoyed it!
The author’s writing style is excellent. The topic was tough for me but the writing was compelling. One of my book clubs read the book for discussion next week. I was reminded about Nigerian politics through Ayobami Stay With Me. I also love the title.
This is not a book to read In The Time of Covid. The final reveal at the end of the book came too late.
The story was not what I expected, but was rather intriguing and pulled you into the characters’ lives wondering what would happen to them. Snippets of political history are woven into the story which I would have loved to know more about.
This is a beautiful book of hopes and perseverance and love…in a completely different culture….
I’ve been thinking about this debut for a long time after reading it. And in my opinion, that’s the mark of a great writer in the making. The writing is very good, the plot hauntingly authentic, complex and heart-wrenching, but what I found truly brave and interesting about this author was the skill to perfectly capture the complexity of all that layered feeling existing ‘between’ these flawed characters in a way which doesn’t come across as trite. This is a novel full of shocking revelations, twists and turns, cultural nuance aplenty, and turbulence ‘beyond belief’. It is a ‘telling’ not an invitation for the reader to be ‘satisfied’ with the end or for the characters to be somehow redeemed. This was a ‘telling-it-like-it-is’, without bowing to the sentimental. A very clever and most interesting read. A story that lingers, keeping you thinking long and hard about so many angles … for that reason, I’m bumping this up from a 4,5 to a 5 star read.
I enjoyed this book! Very different family dynamics…….made for an interesting story
A glimpse into a very different world.
Refreshingly different.
This book took you into the world of Nigerian plural marriage and the expectations that extended family were allowed to have on a couples’ marriage. The tragedy of a secret kept and the pain of motherhood will keep you reading well into the night until the end.
This was a heartbreaking story of Akin and Yejide, who fall in love in college, and marry. Yejide is unable to get pregnant, but no one knows why. The doctors say there is nothing wrong with her, and her husband, Akin, says there is nothing wrong with him. Yejide is under intense pressure to produce an heir – all the relatives are constantly harping on Yejide to bear a child. After no luck, Akin is forced to take another wife. Yejide decides to try all sorts of things, including seeking out a “specialist” to help her get pregnant so that her husband, who she dearly loves, will not get the other wife pregnant first.
This is a story of a marriage in turmoil, of hidden secrets and deception, of traitors and family. There is heartbreak in Yejide’s life, along with turmoil of their country. Akin and his brother also have a falling out over a big secret.
So many things go wrong for Yejide, and she doesn’t know if she can handle any more trauma in her life. However, there is one thing that goes right for her, and it looks as there may be redemption.
#StayWithMe #AyobamiAdebayo
Drama about the relationships between people and the secrets they keep from each other, set in Nigeria as it entered the instability of the 1990’s.
Interesting characters, an unusual and heart wrenching story. So vwey well written.
A wonderful debut novel! This was a roller coaster of emotions. I felt all the characters were well written making it hard not to get emotionally connected to them. Yejide and Akin’s marriage started out perfect but then was full of disappointments, lies, and tragedies. The ending shocked me I really wasn’t expecting that but it seemed so fitting.
Made for an interesting book club discussion, learned about a different part of the world and their culture. But still found the emotional context incredibly relatable.