Half of a Yellow Sun

Meant to post this a few months ago but I guess I didn't hit publish.

I just finished reading a very good book by an author I've heard much about but hadn't read anything by. I should warn you that it's bleak (but not in a cold way) and is ultimately a war story (which btw, I didn't know, so it became more engaging in a way). I would liken the feeling to watching Graveyard of the fireflies. 

I'm ultimately shocked by how engaging it was, but I'm not sure how much is in the writing and just my current mood of disengagement with reality, but I wanted to write about the latter today (also should mention I had a bit of urgency to get through the book to not waste my library loan for another that's expiring). Though the book is set in a much different time, it feels weirdly understandable or relatable. The character writing is obviously very good, but again it might be me, reaching a little, in a selfish and privileged way. But this isn't the oppression olympics, it just is maybe. I wonder if maybe it's my own self-judgement, that makes me feel like "first-world problems" are unreal and that only "objectively bad" situations like war and famine are justified. I read once that people on the spectrum enjoy anime precisely because of this exaggeration of real emotions that allows them to feel it. I wonder if it is the same phenomena. 

These days, my malaise feels chosen. It feels petulant, like I'm waiting for somebody to "give me my just rewards" before I relent and feel happiness. It also feels like the real lesson is for me to wait for it, and for that patience to dissolve and in anger realize this is entirely self-inflicted, for believing in some sort of justice or due for doing things nobody asks for. I liked that one of the managers, a wise, mild-mannered, and affable person usually, pushed back quite strongly on me saying I was people pleasing in a half-joking way. I appreciated that he wanted me to take it seriously, and not feed the ironic vanity that came from declaring my people-pleasing attitude in a half-joking way - an act of self-pity.