The Son of the House

Title: The Son of the House
Author: ​Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia
Reviewer: Nancy Richards
Sandwiched between an abduction and release, are the lives of two women: Nwabulu, a tall busy dressmaker, and Julie,  an overweight wealthy widow. Forced together under dark circumstances, they use the time to unfold their stories to each other.
I wanted to weep at Nwabulu’s opening line, it’s 1972 and ‘I had been a housemaid for nearly half my life when I met Urenna. My first sojourn as a housemaid began when I was ten.’ So here was a girl-child marked to struggle. After her father dies she is left with a barren stepmother who blames her for everything, gives her nothing and finally sends her away to be a ‘housemaid’ – a derogatory title if ever, more especially when it is spat out in denial. She is ‘sixteen, on the way to seventeen’ when she meets and falls for the gentle, winsome and educated Urenna, ‘son of the house’ of her friends employers. Dicing with danger to understate the situation. I won’t spoil the journey by saying more, but this bright if battered determined soul manages to survive the unfair flack that seems to  befall so many young women of Africa.
By contrast, in 1973 we meet lush and lovely Julie under more generous if ill-fated circumstances. ‘He touched the gold necklace between my breasts, lifting it slightly with his long fingers, weighing the pendant….’Consumer of my wealth’, he laughed at me. I pushed my irritation down into my belly and found an answering smile.’ Hers is a journey of deception and dangerous decisions.
Needless to say at the conclusion of the book a connection between the two women dawns. You can see it coming, but hardly dare breathe for the pain it will inevitably cause. It is a cunning but compassionate story filled with detail that takes you straight to the heart of the setting, the smells, sounds and textures tangible.
As a mother with two ‘sons of the house’ the title appealed to me as much as the fact of this being another novel from story-rich Nigeria – and a debut at that. I may be wrong, but it seems to me first time writers pour so much of themselves into their first-born books.  Lawyer and academic Onyemelukwe-Onuobia must have drawn deeply into her own well spring for this one.
Reviewer: Nancy Richards

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