Half of a yellow sun

Summary/Review: A profoundly gripping story told primarily through the eyes and lives of Ugwu, a 13 year old peasant houseboy who survives conscription into the raggedy Biafran army, and twin sisters Olanna and Kainene, who are from a wealthy and well connected family. Tumultuous politics power the plot, and several sections are harrowing, particularly passages depicting the savage butchering of Olanna and Kainene's relatives. But this dramatic, intelligent epic has its lush and sultry side as well: rebellious Olanna is the mistress of Odenigbo, a university professor brimming with anticolonial zeal ; business-minded Kainene takes as her lover fair haired, blue eyed Richard, a British expatriate come to Nigeria to write a book about Igbo Ukwu art and whose relationship with Kainene nearly ruptures when he spends one drunken night with Olanna.