Kangaroo Valley Voice Book Club

This month we look at Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

This is a rich and multilayered novel. The structure of the book is four interconnecting dramatic storylines. At its heart it is a story of female friendship. A recurring theme in each of these middle-aged women’s lives is the terrible men, ‘the thieves of time’, that have caused the upset and piling up of their hopes and dreams. Thus, the title.

The novel is four loosely linked narratives of women during the COVID pandemic: Chiamaka, a wannabe travel writer from a wealthy family; her best friend, Zikora, a lawyer; her shifty banker cousin turned postgrad student Omelogor; and her Guinean housekeeper, Kadiatou. Kadiatou’s story, based on a retelling of a true assault crime, eventually takes centre stage. However, the retelling of some elements of these stories from different perspectives deepens and reframes the reader’s understanding of all four of the women.

The women are well rounded dimensional characters and Adichie supplies us with just enough day-to-day detail to make them so. The men in comparison are awful but also not very well-developed characters. They refuse to change beard oil that causes a rash, they gift unwanted scented candles and berate a girlfriend for ordering a mimosa in Paris. They don’t tell you they are married, they dump pregnant girlfriends and have secret families. The truly vile men gaslight, abuse and rape. There are few decent rounded men in this book.

The novel also provides some well-wrought cultural insights into immigration, status, social hierarchy and the intersections between race and gender. But at its heart it is about female resilience, perseverance and strength against all odds.

Dream Count is the fourth novel by this Nigerian-born author. She’s won multiple awards for her novels and was named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2015. Adichie is a powerful storyteller. This is Adichie’s first novel in 10 years and hopefully it won’t be another decade before she writes another.

Cathryn Ferguson

Published 1st June 2025 By Cathryn Ferguson

The review for the July edition of the Voice will be Raising Hare: A Memoir by Chloe Dalton. This is one for the many nature lovers among us. With similarities to the best-selling H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald, Raising Hare is about how caring for a wild animal can change your outlook on life. The story is told over the three years of COVID lockdown and it chronicles the author’s care for and friendship with a wild baby hare.

Read along with us and see if you agree with our review next month.

Chloe Dalton is a bestselling author and foreign policy advisor. She spent over a decade working in the UK Parliament and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and has advised, and written for and with, numerous prominent figures. She divides her time between London and her home in the English countryside. A graduate of Oriel College, Oxford University, Chloe recently completed an MBA at Oxford’s Said Business School.

Her debut book, Raising Hare, was an instant Sunday Times Bestseller and was recently longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction 2025 and shortlisted for the Hatchards Best First Biography Prize, as well as Waterstones Book of the Year 2024. Raising Hare was also a Book of the Year for the Hay Festival, Sunday Times, The Times, Financial Times and Spectator.