In every mirror she's Black A novel

Award-winning journalist and photographer Åkerström enters the world of fiction with a striking debut that portrays three Black women brought together by their interactions with an eccentric Swedish CEO and millionaire. Kemi Adeyemi is a top marketing executive but a failure at love. So when Jonny von Lundin offers her a job with double her present salary and her own department in a new country, it seems like the perfect opportunity to reignite her dating life. Brittany-Rae Johnson is a model-turned-flight-attendant swept up into Jonny's lavish lifestyle and obsession with her. Refugee Muna Saheed has a chance at securing a new home, thanks to Jonny hiring her to clean his firm's offices. As entertaining as it is revealing, Åkerström's novel has readers hoping that each of these women is able to break free from toxic expectations and achieve her every dream and ambition. Along the way, Åkerström also delivers poignant commentary on Swedish culture and the price Black women pay by virtue of the color of their skin. A guaranteed favorite for fans of Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie's Americanah (2013).

Three Black women in search of a better life end up in Sweden in this convincing debut from Nigerian writer Åkerström. Linking all three is wealthy, enigmatic CEO Johan "Jonny" von Lundin. Kemi Adeyemi, 34, a Nigerian American professional, is headhunted by Jonny's Stockholm PR firm. Muna Saheed, a 20-year-old janitor at Jonny's firm, fled from Somalia two years earlier, leaving behind her family and the man she was in love with. Flight attendant Brittany-Rae Johnson, 38, was born in America to first-generation immigrants from Jamaica, and her life changes when she meets Jonny on a plane, then moves to Stockholm and marries him, before learning he has a racial fetish and some heavy baggage involving an ex. The profusion of themes and plotlines, all tenuously connected to Jonny, can feel a bit unwieldy, but Åkerström powerfully conveys all of the women's experiences with race as Muna is pushed to the limit with racist taunts from strangers and Kemi gradually comes to terms with the realities of the city's currents of racism ("Stockholm tricked her. Seduced her with its beauty and then turned into an ugly monster in front of her"). All in all, it's a worthy effort. Agent: Jessica Craig, Craig Literary. (Sept.)

The lives of three very different Black women intertwine around the enigmatic chief executive of a Swedish marketing company. Neither Muna Saheed, Brittany-Rae Johnson, nor Kemi Adeyemi ever envisioned themselves living in Sweden's capital--a city, Kemi muses, so magnetic that "if Stockholm was a man and she'd met him in a nightclub, she would have propelled herself right away to ask him to dance." And though each hails from different backgrounds--Kemi is a young Nigerian American advertising executive quickly rising up the professional ranks; Brittany's a disillusioned Jamaican American model-turned--flight attendant; and Muna's a traumatized Somali refugee--they share a vital trait: Each, in Swedish society, is marked as a Black woman and foreign transplant before anything else. Each, too, is linked to Johan "Jonny" von Lundin, the CEO of von Lundin Marketing and seemingly a manifestation of Sweden's status quo--racially, culturally, and economically. In three interlocking narratives that eventually draw the women into closer orbit, each fights to carve a path within insular Swedish society. Kemi, lured to von Lundin Marketing for a position as a director of global diversity, must continually prove herself to her colleagues amid entrenched stereotypes of Black and American women. As her budding relationship with Jonny grows serious, Brittany grapples with the isolating, classist milieu he lives within. Meanwhile, Muna, who cleans the von Lundin offices, tries to stitch together a makeshift family to replace the one she's lost. As the women contend with Swedish language, norms, and expectations, it becomes clear that as long as the interests of Black women remain subservient to White feminism, each must construct her own life template and determine whether its personal sacrifices are worthwhile. Åkerström paints an admirably rich portrait of a particular culture--its nuances, norms, and idiosyncrasies--raising important questions of prejudice, racial bias, agency, and belonging. Her characters, however, can feel predictable, and her writing, especially in romance scenes, often resorts to clichés. A novel with thematic depth and complexity sometimes undercut by flat characters. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.