This chapter-by-chapter summary contains plot spoilers!

Buy at Amazon: Half of a Yellow Sun

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Orange Prize

Note to readers: this is a chapter-by-chapter plot synopsis and contains spoilers. If this isn't what you want, please go to the review (no spoilers) of Half of a Yellow Sun. Half of a Yellow Sun is a terrific book, and I urge you to read it for yourself.  (Brought to you by kat impatientreader.com)

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Book Summary:  Olanna, a beautiful Igbo woman almost loses her both her husband and her sister when her evil mother-in-law tries to destroy her marriage.  Meanwhile, civil war breaks out between the Muslim Hausas and the Christian Igbos, and the two sisters and their men are caught up in the Igbo attempt to form the independent republic of Biafra.

Characters:  (purple = viewpoint character)

• Olanna - Igbo, non-identical twin sister to Kainene and Odenigbo's lover
• Kainene - Igbo, non-identical twin sister to Olanna and Richard's lover
• Odenigbo - Igbo, a university professor, Olanna's lover, Ugwu's employer
• Richard - white Englishman, Kainene's lover
• Ugwu- Igbo, young houseboy employed by Odenigbo.

Setting: Nigeria in the university town of Nsukka, the northern town of Kano, the cosmopolitan coastal cities of Lagos and Port Harcourt, and the refugee towns of Abba, Umuahia, and Orlu.

Time Period: the 1960s

Title: "Half of a Yellow Sun" refers to the half of a yellow sun on the flag and military uniforms of Biafra.

Viewpoint: Alternating sections, third-person, past tense:  Olanna, Richard, and Ugwu.

Part One – The Early Sixties.

Chapter 1: Ugwu's aunty brings him from his primitive village to the university town of Nsukka to be a houseboy for Professor Odenigbo. Ugwu learns to cook for his master's intellectual friends who visit each night to discuss black African progress.  Then Odenigbo brings home Olanna.  At first, Ugwu fears her potential to introduce change.  Then he falls in love with her perfect English accent.

Chapter 2: Odenigbo drops Olanna off at the airport so she can fly to Lagos to visit her wealthy family.  She remembers when she first saw Odenigbo at a theater: the ticket-seller tried to skip a white man past all the black people standing in line, and Odenigbo asserted himself, thereby catching her interest.  Back home in Lagos, she avoids her sarcastic sister Kainene who speaks briefly of her white  English lover Richard.

The next day Olanna travels to Kano to visit her uncle's extended family.  She admires their wholesome simplicity but deplores their squalor. She visits her ex-lover Mohammed to tell him that she is with Odenigbo now.  Mohammed, a wealthy Muslim Hausa, takes it well though he's obviously still in love with her. Olanna returns to Odenigbo's house in Nsukka and tries to fit in with his intellectual friends at their nightly gatherings.
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