Purple Hibiscus

I finally got to read Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's first novel, Purple Hibiscus.  Definitely not for the younger child...a frightening, almost Gothic, tale of family dysfunction... the father, Eugene, is so repressed by inner-demons that he demands Christian perfection from his two children and wife, while struggling, as successful businessman and newspaper owner, against the collapsing Nigeria of military coups and riots.  The narrator, Kambili, is a nuanced and sensitive girl, coming of age, slowly realizing that the fear she experiences at home is not normal, but dreadfully wrong.  There are flaws in the novel: some of the adult characters are flat and/or overdrawn, and the ending is, well, somehow the novel had to end, so Adichie decided to end with a bang.  A great novel for the plane ride to Burkina Faso... or a set of evenings at home.