What interested me most in this story when I requested an ARC of it from NetGalley was the theme of friendship between Enitan, Funmi and Zainab.

The strength of the bond that the three protagonists share is remarkable, especially when readers consider their different backgrounds, experiences and personalities. However, the connection that the three characters share is never severed. Instead, it only makes their relationship stronger.

Readers are often treated to stories of friendship between two people. However, Tomi Obaro provides us with multigenerational stories: Enitan, Funmi and Zainab’s histories, with a keen focus on their mothers, and how they came to meet and how their friendship developed.

I found that the catalyst for the women reconnecting many years after they first meet, Funmi’s daughter—Destiny’s—wedding, a natural/realistic plot point (not that the event has to be natural or realistic). Characteristics of Nigerian weddings and cultural practices are interspersed throughout the story, and the complexities of intergenerational familial relationships are familiar to me, a lover of Asian North American literature.

Although I’d be the first to say that I’m not interested in mother-daughter relationships, I somehow seem to be drawn to them without realizing it. I’m reminded of “Cold Enough for Snow” written by Jessica Au “Love Marriage” written by Monica Ali, and “Voting Day” written by Clare O’Dea—all ARCs that I’ve kindly received ARCs from on NetGalley.

However, it truly is the protagonists’ friendship that drew me into this novel. While reading the backstories of each woman, I eagerly devoured this book. I can confirm that—at least for me—I’d much rather read about female friendships which are strong, supportive, and positive than read about: women who sabotage other women, jealousy between women, and/or competitiveness between or among women. I’d rather read stories about sisterhood, a sisterhood that, as we can see from recent American politics, is being threatened due to politics that have divided women off all colours…Although one could argue that we’ve never been united.

And yet, this story gives readers hope; it’s given me hope that as women we recognize there’s a problem, give ourselves a moment to pause, take a step back, and follow the lead of the female characters in Tomi Obaro’s story, Dele Weds Destiny, and—instead of tearing one another down—lift one another up.

This is definitely a book I want to hear more people talk about!

Many thanks to Hodder & Stoughton and NetGalley for allowing me the chance to read an ARC of Tomi Obaro’s new novel, Dele Weds Destiny.

Dele Weds Destiny tells the story of 3 friends, Enitan, Zainab, and Funmi, who have managed to stay in touch since their university days and reunite years later for one of their daughter's wedding.
The story jumps between the present and past as we learn more about how the women came to be friends, and how their past has informed their present selves. The novel touches on many themes, including friendship, family, sexuality, race and so much more with such depth and tenderness that made the book a joy to read.
My only con was that the book ends abruptly and I would've liked it to have come to a better resolution, but then again nothing in life is ever that simple which I believe was the point!

This is an enjoyable easy read about female strength, friendship and coming of age into independence. Rich with Nigerian culture and history as it's backdrop we follow three Nigerian friends. The story begins with the women in their forties and then takes us back to their college days helping us to understand the roots of their friendship and the women they came to be. This book is full of a vivid sense of place and strong characterisation with a good compelling plot. This honest review is written with thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this book.

I was a little disappointed in this book. The title is Dele weds Destiny yet somehow the wedding felt a bit of a tangent!

The main story of the book for me is the relationships of 3 women who all met at university in Nigeria and have moved on with their lives. I understand the wedding is what brings them physically back together but it felt I bit out of place.

Part 1 is the preparations for the wedding and here we meet the characters as they are now, as well as some of their children.

Part 2 then returns to how they all met and looks at each individual life. This part was the most interesting.

Part 3 is the wedding itself and what transpires. This part was interesting for me in learning more about Nigerian weddings and traditions but the storyline here felt superfluous to the book but also felt like it could be a whole other book in itself.

I enjoyed the characters and learning about Nigerian culture, yet somehow I was left a bit confused/disappointed.

The wedding of Dele to Destiny in Nigeria is the reason for the coming together of three women who have been friends for 3 decades. One is Destiny’s mother, one brings her own daughter with her who was raised in America and the third is having a rare break from her very ill husband. We learn how they met and how their experiences shaped them, how they supported each other, how they argued but how the friendship endured. This is a marvellous portrait of women’s lives in a patriarchal society but also of relationships through the generations. I loved these feisty women and enjoyed the portrayal of Nigeria in all its heat and verve.

This was a lovely book to read. The relationship between the three women over time is the cornerstone of the book. The way the author intertwines this with their children make it just a pleasure. The relationships, as frequently with mother and daughter, are often fraught. The author has brought this complicated relationship out well. It is a gentle book but not in anyway slow, but a book to be enoyed.

Three university friends, Zainab, Funmi and Enitan, meet all together for the first time in thirty years at the wedding of Funmi’s daughter, Destiny. Though the friends have maintained their friendship through WhatsApp and email, the complications of busy lives have kept them from all meeting in person.

Enitan has been living in New York after eloping with a white man, hasn’t spent much time back in Nigeria, and is returning with news of her impending divorce and her daughter, with whom she has a fractious relationship. Zainab is caring for a sick husband and her four sons and is exhausted and no longer financially comfortable. Funmi is living in luxury thanks to her rich husband and his undoubtedly shady business deals, and is more concerned with how things look than how her daughter feels.

Taking us back to their university days, the novel explores these women’s friendships and loves in ways that make sense of the present. It’s a beautiful hymn to the complexity of female friendship and how being tough can sometimes be supportive.

A page-turning read that will probably wring a tear from some, Dele Weds Destiny will undoubtedly appeal to many.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this book and I was a bit disappointed when I read it. It's well written for a debut but too many Nigerian words for me. I would have appreciated a Glossary for food and clothing. The first part was ok and the book certainly picked up during Part 2 but then lost ground during the final part. The ending was ok. I think Tomi Obaro has a bright future as a novelist but this one was lacking something for me to give it more than 3 stars. With thanks to NetGalley, the publishers and the author for the opportuity to read and review an e-ARC of this title.

Thank you to Hodder and Stoughton and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Tomi Obaro’s debut follows Funmi, Zainab and Enitan, three best friends who met at university in Nigeria 30 years ago. The narrative weaves between past and present, with each of the protagonists telling their own story. All three women make captivating narrators, but Funmi’s journey stood out to me as the most interesting.

I enjoyed how Obaro demonstrated each character’s growth, exploring how the three women have changed and matured since their time at university, often in unexpected ways.

Obaro also explores the repercussions of trauma and how devastating events that occurred during their time at university shaped the lives of the women, particularly Funmi. Exploring abortion, racism and police brutality, Obaro is not afraid to delve into difficult themes.

Despite the title, the wedding of Funmi’s daughter Destiny is actually more of a sub-plot, taking a back-seat while the narrative concentrates more on Destiny’s mother and her friends.

Overall, this was an engaging and interesting read with well-rounded characters set against a vivid backdrop of present-day Lagos and Northern Nigeria in the 1980s. The novel shines when exploring family relationships and the power of female friendship, and I would definitely read another novel by this exciting new author.

I loved this book from start to end, such an easy book to reading following the 3 friends on a journey of their friendship from university to present day, you got to know each character a little better by the end of the book seeing how each of their lives unfolds and the different paths they have taken but how the bond of their friendship has remained strong over times. As I read I pictured each character in my head by the end of the book I felt like I had gained 3 new friends.
Thank you for the chance to read this book.

The title of the book is quite misleading because it's really not about Dele or Destiny; it's about Destiny's mother and two of her friends. Destiny's wedding is an excuse to bring the three women together decades after they first met as students.

We follow the three women, how they met, highlights (or not) from their lives, and how they come together again for the big event. Their lives are very different - one is from a Christian family, another is a Hijab-wearing Muslim - and their circumstances have become very different. Two became nurses, one wrote plays and stories.

I was excited to start this but ultimately a bit disappointed. The women's stories just didn't seem to flow and I couldn't really find very much of a 'point' to it all. It rambled about without much direction, and took much longer for me to read than it should have because nothing hooked me in to keep reading..

It's undoubtedly well-written but for me it just lacked a reason to keep reading.

Thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for my copy.

An insightful, drama-full, rendition of the lives of three Nigerian female. Delẹ weds Destiny goes beyond the cliche to give us humans who can not only have abortion but can elope with the love of their lives. Telling te story from a three-pronged third person perspective, we get to know the thread that connects Funmi, Zainab and Eniola when at surface level, they had nothing to share.

Though lacking in effective suspense. Obaro makes up for it with fully fleshed characters and plot drive. She don't stop there though, she asks subtly if we really realise how fragile a mother to daughter relationship is, and if when we look at our life we would see the mixed agony of our mothers at those moments when we defy them.

I love debut authors as you just don’t know what to expect and this was a real treat. Set in Nigeria three friends of thirty years meet to celebrate a wedding. The book explores where they are now but also the history of their friendship, how they met at university and how their lives diverged but how the friendship remains despite all the history between them. I enjoy reading books from cultures so different from my own and I loved these three women, their diversity but also their bond and support of each other at times of crisis. I laughed and cried over their life choices and how these affected them and their relationships with their daughters. I would thoroughly recommend this book and look forward to more from this author. Many thanks to Netgalley, Hodder and Stoughton for the opportunity of reading this ARC in return for an honest review.

Zainab, Funmi and Enitan first meet at University in northern Nigeria, all learning how to become themselves. It's an experience that binds the three very different women together. When Enitan moves to New York to elope with a white man, Zainab and Funmi are left behind, with drastically different fortunes.
Over the course of thirty years, their lives and friendships diverge and change. Enitan is separating from her husband, trying to understand her daughter Remi. Zainab finds herself the sole breadwinner for her husband and their four sons. And Funmi is living a life of confined luxury, as the wife of a successful, shady businessman.
But theirs is a friendship that can endure decades of distance. And in 2015, they are reunited for the first time for the wedding of Funmi's daughter, Destiny.
Here they will reflect on their pasts, the things they loved and lost - but the present brings unexpected surprises too, because their daughters, Remi and Destiny, might just be as rebellious and open-hearted as they once were. A lovely book with a great cast of characters. Beautifully written and I got really invested in the story. I would highly recommend reading this one.

I love reading books from different cultural backgrounds to myself and they feel like an education to me.
Dele Weds Destiny is set in Nigeria and the story is told through the eyes of three different protagonists; old friends from university.
The story jumps over there different eras, their childhood background, their university years and 2015, when one of them has a daughter getting married, and they are finally together after many years.
All three characters, though Nigerian, come from very different backgrounds and the book explores the familial expectations, the friendship these three young women forge, disappointments, and sacrifices, as well as how fortunes can turn.
A rich, cultural explosion.
Many thanks to NetGalley and Hodder and Stoughton for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was a great read, filled with depth and details that spoke of friendship, love, and family. What worked really well for me was the use of the extensive flashback chapters in the middle, which took the tale of three friends in differing circumstances into more rich and absorbing tale. The flashbacks really helped to show how they had ended up in their current situations and made the ending more satisfying.

If anything, I would have liked a little more in the past, as I was enjoying so much of how they reacted to the various changes in each other's lives, but I can see how the choice of timings added to the emphasis on the three women together rather than their lives apart.

A recommended read!

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC

"But in real life, injustice was rife and inevitable. Life was fundamentally, cruelly, capriciously unfair. Jacob stole his blessing for Esau. G-d blessed Jacob anyway. The poor died young and the rich lived long, healthy, lives. [...] Heaven Enitan could take or leave, to be honest. The thought of worshipping G-d forever and ever scared her. What was forever anyway? But Hell.. Please let there be Hell."

Trigger warning: abortion, self harm, death.

Obaro delivered a breath-taking novel centred around three old friends, Enitan, Funmi and Zainab. The story flits between present day and the past, chronicling how the three met and their journey through adolescence at university, to who they became in the future.

The story focuses on three wildly different protagonists, from their religions, their morals and their histories. Every moment of joy was so beautiful and overdue, but every moment of suffering cut deeper than the last. I felt overwhelmed with certain plot themes, including the very graphic description of an abortion in the 1980's in Nigeria. The constant balancing act of seeking out true happiness against seeking out what is the best long term option was a fascinating juggling act to observe and seeing the long term results and fruits of the protagonists labours left me pondering my own life choices.

It's rare to find a book that speaks to you in a way that makes you reflect on your own choices. After reaching the end of the book, I found myself returning to the beginning again to really see how the stories of each character played out. I pondered how each individual changed and the possible driving factors. I really took the book further in my mind and invested myself in it, which is rare.

Thank you for such a beautiful story Tomi Obaro, and thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

A stunning debut from Obaro and a beautiful piece of literary fiction, which I have had the privilege of reading via the Tandem Collective.

Well written with some amazing, resilient female characters, all with their own flaws, and a friendship that has cemented them together for over thirty years.

The author created such a visual treat, with the descriptions of the food, the use of the language and their culture, allowing me to immerse myself into the pages.

Many thanks to The Tandem Collective for my readalong spot.

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐

I would struggle to be able to review this book due to issues with the file/download. The issues stopped the flow of the book. The issues are:
- Missing words in the middle of sentences
- Stop/start sentences on different lines
- No clear definition of chapters.

Not sure if it was a file/download issue but there were lots of gaps, stop/starts which really ruined the flow. I would love the chance to read a better version as the description of the book appeals to me.

I blitzed through this book over the weekend as I just could not get enough. Light and witty I enjoyed every second. Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.