Superb exploration of culture clashes in Africa - Rated 
This book is superb. It tells the story of Tambudzai, a Zimbabwean girl from a poor rural family whose determination and some luck enable her to 'better herself' with an education thanks to her rich uncle. However, Tambudzai discovers that 'Englishness' comes at a terrible price.
Tambudzai is an immediately likeable narrator and the story is enjoyable and engaging to read from the first page. It is full of witty and accurate observations, realistic characters, some great humour, and also some very painful parts. I found it hard to put down, even though it is not an especially dramatic story.
Nervous Conditions has strong themes of feminism and colonialism, and the changing role of women in African society. The contrast between Tambudzai's poverty stricken parents and her Western-educated aunt and uncle, and the conflict that arises in Tambudzai as she tries to find a path between the two, is the driving force of the novel. But despite the seriousness of it's themes, there is a lot to like about this story and plenty of observational humour.
The book offers no easy answers and does a great job of showing the good and bad points of both traditional African and a Westernised way of life. Tambudzai is contrasted with her cousin Nyasha, who finds herself unable to fit in to either her traditional way of life or the 'developed' society of the West.
There's a good twist and the ending is unexpected and heartbreaking, as well as inconclusive enough to leave you desperate for a sequel. This is certainly the best book I've read this year. Fans of Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche (Half of A Yellow Sun, Purple Hibiscus) will enjoy this book as the two authors have a similar style. If you haven't read either, do try them - I can't imagine you'll be disappointed.
Big subjects on a tiny stage - Rated 
The feminist and colonial themes that underpin this novel have their colours tied to the mast. At times, the characters words sound like speeches, delivered from a platform. While in a way this heavy-handedness seems to me to be a weakness of the novel, as a piece of fiction, it does pack quite a punch.
The characters are beautifully drawn and it's they that keep you turning the pages, because there is little going on in terms of a narrative plotline. From time to time, things move rather too slowly - like when our narrator, Tambu, first arrives at the mission school - but in the main, the gentle unfolding of the plot works because it is populated by such 3-dimensional characters. Although everyone is in some way flawed, the author gives them all their own voice, allowing them the opportunity to explain themselves, their mindset and their actions. Though choosing not to engage with the issue of 1960s Rhodesian apartheid, the author does take a close up look at the impact of race and colonisation at a family level, and indeed at a personal level. This is not the sweeping political tale that a male writer might have told, but racism and sexism on a micro level, shaping and directing the lives of a handful of women and girls.
An unseen window to the world of African women - Rated 
Set in colonial Rhodesia, Tsitsi Dangarembga's novel chronicles the beginning of Tambudzai's new life after her brother's untimely death leaves the way open for her to acquire an education.
Coming from poverty, Tambudzai's shot at gaining a much-desired education relies on chance and the benevolence of her greatly revered, educated uncle, who believes that someone in every branch of his family should have an education to help allieviate the poverty endured by the rest. However, Tambudzai's initial desire to expand her horizons brings its own challenges and contradictions with it, best illustrated through the person of her cousin Nyasha, whose Westernised behaviour is increasingly regarded as unbecoming of a girl.
Although this is at times quite a heavy read, desribing in some detail the lives of rural African women around their often incompetent but ever superior men-folk, and despite the fact that it has a very unsatisfactory ending, this remains a very thoughtful and insightful book. There are so few African novels about women, that it is refreshing to read about often unseen characters. Although you are constantly aware of their second-class status within their families, schools and society at large, this is engaging and quietly gripping and I'm left feelng that there should be more to come of Tambudzai's story.
Love this book! - Rated
I absolutely love this book! From the first line you know this is going to be an engaging story - "I was not sorry when my brother died". A sign of impending events - a great hook into the story. Definitely recommended!
Great Read - Rated
"Nervous conditions" is a book about colonialism and the alienating influence it has on people who lose touch with their roots. It is a dilemma for African children who are seeking education who often find that in adopting the new culture of the colonizers, they often can no longer associate with the traditional ways of their own people. This superbly written book will touch any reader to the core. The writer clearly dissected the negative effects of colonialism and the settler-politics that caused so much strife in Zimbabwe, creating two tragedies in the persons of Ian Smith and Robert Mugabe. This very powerful and touching novel is not only revealing but also opens our minds to more questions, the most powerful of which is the problem of the "colonized mind', a diseases that is still plaguing Africa until today.Another good recommendation is DISCIPLES OF FORTUNE, THE OLD MAN AND THE MEDAL
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