What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours (Oyeyemi) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
Summarizing Oyeyemi is like trying to tell a dream.... Casual and accessible at the sentence level, [these stories] are not so much experimental as deeply comfortable with the pre-narrative and proto-narrative impulses at the heart of storytelling.
Chicago Tribune


Magical and show stopping.
Elle.com


An enchanting and beautifully crafted first collection of stories, linked by the recurrence of keys…Oyeyemi’s storytelling is without parallel.
BBC.com


In this collection of short stories, there are many keys that unlock many things. . .  What links them all? You’ll want to open and see.
Cosmopolitan


These modern fairy tales from award-winning author Helen Oyeyemi…will unlock your imagination with stories of love, loss, and...keys...magical, feverish, spooky, and delightful.
Marie Claire


Helen Oyeyemi is a literary genius, and it shows in this fantastic collection of short stories.... With characters that will welcome you, push you, and surprise you, Oyeyemi's writing takes you past your expectations.
Bustle


In her first story collection, Oyeyemi conjures present-day Europe, made enticingly strange by undercurrents of magic, and populated by ghosts, sentient puppets, and possible witches alongside middle-aged psychiatrists, tyrants, and feminist undergrads.
Publishers Weekly


The prolific and immensely talented Oyeyemi presents fantastical short stories that all revolve around a key, whether literal or metaphorical.
Library Journal


(Starred review.) These nine casually interlocking stories, set in a familiar yet surreal contemporary world, overflow with the cerebral humor and fantastical plots that readers have come to expect from Oyeyemi.... For all the portentous metaphors (keys and locks appear in every story) and all the convoluted and fabulist narrations, Oyeyemi's stories are often cheerfully sentimental.
Kirkus Reviews