Reclaiming

Reclaiming by Yewande Biala

Reviewed by Mimi
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Thank you to @hodderbooks for this copy!

Former biomedical scientist and Love Island contestant Yewande presents a collection of essays in her debut book about figuring out who she is. Now I am a great believer in people getting reading and I think someone with the profile of Yewande will certainly achieve that. It doesn't matter how you come to learn about something, it's good that you do.

However, I don't feel this book really made the impact I was looking for. There were certainly chapters I enjoyed more than others, for example, the chapter where she goes into detail about her name and how unsettling and frankly offensive it is when people don't bother to get her name right was so insightful and I felt real empathy to it. Others like the career chapter I felt were rushed and unconvincing.

I think this sort of book is a really helpful perspective to read but there were some parts where I felt like it was being slightly reduced down and Yewande and her editors were thinking about how to make it as accessible as possible. These sorts of things don't need to be oversimplified in my opinion. The life experience deserves to be shared in all its detail.