The Girl with the Louding Voice: A Novel - Hardcover

Daré, Abi

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1524746029 ISBN 13: 9781524746025

Publisher: Dutton, 2020

A powerful, emotional debut novel told in the unforgettable voice of a young Nigerian woman who is trapped in a life of servitude but determined to get an education so that she can escape and choose her own future.

“A bold new storyteller...Abi Daré's fearless debut is a celebration of girls who dare to dream and those who help unfurl their wings so that they might soar.”
—Imbolo Mbue, New York Times bestselling author of Behold the Dreamers (Oprah’s Book Club pick)

Adunni is a fourteen-year-old Nigerian girl who knows what she wants: an education. This, her mother has told her, is the only way to get a “louding voice”—the ability to speak for herself and decide her own future. But instead, Adunni's father sells her to be the third wife of a local man who is eager for her to bear him a son and heir.

When Adunni runs away to the city, hoping to make a better life, she finds that the only other option before her is servitude to a wealthy family. As a yielding daughter, a subservient wife, and a powerless slave, Adunni is told, by words and deeds, that she is nothing.

But while misfortunes might muffle her voice for a time, they cannot mute it. And when she realizes that she must stand up not only for herself, but for other girls, for the ones who came before her and were lost, and for the next girls, who will inevitably follow; she finds the resolve to speak, however she can—in a whisper, in song, in broken English—until she is heard.

About the Author:

Abi Daré grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, and has lived in the UK for eighteen years. She studied law at the University of Wolverhampton and has an MSc in International Project Management from Glasgow Caledonian University as well as an MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck, University of London. The Girl with the Louding Voice won the Bath Novel Award for unpublished manuscripts in 2018 and was also selected as a finalist in the 2018 Literary Consultancy Pen Factor competition. Abi lives in Essex with her husband and two daughters, who inspired her to write her debut novel.

Review:

"A bold new storyteller...Abi Daré's fearless debut is a celebration of girls who dare to dream and those who help unfurl their wings so that they might soar.”
—Imbolo Mbue, New York Times bestselling author of Behold the Dreamers (Oprah’s Book Club pick)

“Abi Daré’s debut novel The Girl with the Louding Voice is a beautifully rendered, achingly real portrait of Adunni, a young woman finding her strength and shaping her destiny in modern day Nigeria. Adunni’s voice weaves and dances its way across the pages with a rhythm that captivated me, astonished me and, more than once, broke my heart. Brava to Daré for bringing this compelling character out of the shadows and into our lives.”

—Tara Conklin, New York Times bestselling author of The House Girl and The Last Romantics

“A stunning novel—original, beautiful and powerful. I was utterly captivated by Adunni and her mesmerizing louding voice.”
—Rosamund Lupton, New York Times bestselling author of Sister

"The Girl With the Louding Voice is a character for the ages. Adunni is a girl who narrates her own suffering with levity, who paints depth and texture and beauty into her Nigerian homeland, who tenderly cultivates her own humanity even while everything around her seeks to thwart it. She is an ambassador for girls everywhere. She is important, funny, brave, and enduring. Abi Daré has written an unforgettable novel, by the strength of her own louding voice."
—Jeanine Cummins, author of American Dirt

“Heartbreaking and inspiring...A moving story of what it means to fight for the right to live the life you choose.”
—Kirkus

"A powerful debut about fighting for our dreams.”
—PopSugar

• Publisher: Dutton
• Publication date: 2020
• ISBN 10: 1524746029
• ISBN 13: 9781524746025
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384