Book Review and Reflection of The Book of Memory by Petina Gappah
Published: 2015
Country: Zimbabwe
Genre: Fiction
Introduction
The Book of Memory is one of those books you finish and keep wondering if it’s a true story, not just fiction. So many nuances and crevices sound too real to be made up. That is a testament to the author’s brilliant prose.
Book Summary
Memory has been sentenced to death for killing a white man. As she languishes behind bars, her lawyer asks her to write down everything she can remember about what happened. She decides to write her life story, both for her lawyer, who is trying to reduce her sentence to life imprisonment instead of death, and for an American journalist who visited her.
Memory was born with albinism, a condition that has defined her existence since birth. It determined whether she would be accepted and whether she belonged, even within her own family. As a child, she longed for melanin so that she could look like everyone around her. Her mother was particularly averse to her. She openly spoke of Memory’s condition as a curse and an illness, rejecting her at various points. Her father, at least when she was a child, seemed to be the only one in her corner, until one unusual Sunday when they dressed her in her Sunday best and took her to meet a white man named Lloyd, the same man whose murder she would later be accused and convicted of. They took her to sell her.
She moved in with Lloyd, who told her he had “taken her in”, a story Memory understood as a cover for what had truly happened – he bought her from her parents. But Lloyd treated her well. He educated her, and as a university professor, he enabled her to live a life far removed from her family’s, a life filled with opportunities she likely never could have imagined: a good education, access to skincare products she desperately needed, and the chance to travel, live, and study abroad.
However, Lloyd also lived a life that would have been considered an anomaly in his community. He would not have been accepted had he been honest about who he truly was. As Memory later reflects, perhaps that was why Lloyd understood her better than most, the sense of never truly belonging, even in one’s own family.
Tragically, Memory and Lloyd had a terrible encounter that led to a horrible decision and action on Memory’s part. This created a distance between them for over a decade. When she eventually returned, Lloyd died, and Memory was accused of his murder and locked away. While incarcerated, Memory discovers the truth about her family: her mother’s struggles, her father’s desperate attempts to protect his children, and the truth about Lloyd.
The book is heartbreaking in every aspect. But the last chapter takes the crown; it is thoroughly heartbreaking. I kept desperately hoping for a good ending for Memory.
Themes
The book explores several poignant themes, including discrimination layered across different dimensions. For instance, Memory is born into a poor family, lacking the melanin that her family members enjoy. She is different, rejected by her mother, and navigates life in a township as a person living with albinism. Later, she must also navigate white society. All this while carrying the burden of knowing that her parents sold her to a white man.
Themes of religion, spirituality, and mental health are also prominent. And of course, as African nations, we can never fully escape the ravages of colonialism and the conditions that followed after its formal end.
Recommendation
The Book of Memory is brilliantly written. Petina Gappah’s prose is phenomenal. As I said before, it almost feels real, as if this truly happened, and that Memory is out there somewhere. And of course, it’s never too far-fetched. Many “Memories” exist, maybe not with the exact circumstances, but close enough.
I rate this book 5 out of 5, and I would recommend everyone read it.
A good friend has also recommended her award-winning An Elegy for Easterly, which won the Guardian First Book Award in 2009. I’ll be reading and reviewing that one very soon.
If you enjoyed this review, you may also like the Book Review and Reflection of We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo.
About the Author
Petina Gappah is a Zimbabwean lawyer and writer, with several acclaimed books to her name, including the subject of this review. In 2016, she was named African Literary Person of the Year by Brittle Paper.
On LinkedIn, Gappah describes herself as:
A graduate of the universities of Cambridge, Graz, and Zimbabwe, I am an international lawyer with more than 15 years of experience in international trade law.
In 1998, I completed a PhD on the regulation of investment and competition policy from a WTO perspective. Since then, my legal career has focused on the law of the WTO. Accordingly, I have built up a formidable knowledge of the WTO legal regime and dispute settlement system.
From 2002 until 2016, I was one of the pioneer Counsel at the Advisory Centre on WTO Law, where I represented WTO Members as litigants before panels and the Appellate Body, taught trade law to government officials, and provided legal advice on their WTO rights and obligations to more than 70 developing countries from Africa, Asia, as well as Latin America and the Caribbean.
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Jen Nghishitende
Jen Nghishitende is a Namibian writer, researcher, and mother based in the UK. She is the founder of African Queens' Ink, her passion project launched in December 2024. The blog amplifies the voices of African women and women of African descent through storytelling, literature, and advocacy. Jen is a former lecturer and postgraduate researcher, and she now works as an Equality and Human Rights Project Manager. Her work weaves together personal experience, scholarly insight, and deep cultural roots—exploring themes such as motherhood, migration, identity, and freedom. She holds a PhD focused on the lived experiences of women who have survived modern slavery. When she’s not reading or writing, she’s exploring the great outdoors, traveling, or making and eating delicious food with her daughter.