64 pages • 2 hours read
Nikki MayThis Motherless Land
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2024A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 1Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1: “1978”
Part 1, Chapter 1 Summary: “Funke”
Content Warning: This section of the text depicts racism, substance use, suicidal ideation, self-harm, death, and child loss.
Nine-year-old Oluwafunke “Funke” Oyenuga lives in Lagos, Nigeria, with her mother, father, and brother, Femi. On the way to school, she is scolded for bickering with Femi. Mum constantly stresses the importance of the two getting along, which Funke assumes is because of Mum’s troubled relationship with her own sister, Margot.
Mum’s family lives in England and Funke has never met them. They live on their estate known as The Ring, where Mum grew up, which Mum describes often to Funke, with its swimming pool, gardens, and service staff. According to Mum, Margot “resents” Mum for the attention she got from their parents as children; however, her parents “disowned” Mum for marrying a Black man.
Mum teaches art at Funke’s school. Funke is embarrassed by her as she is eccentric, with large hats and tie-dyed clothing. Mum insists that everyone, including the students, call her “Lizzie.” As a result, Funke does her best to blend in at school, intentionally getting third or fourth in her class and having Bimpe, their housegirl, braid her hair to match the other students.
On Saturday, Dad makes breakfast, then goes into the village. He visits his mother, Iya Nla, once a month. Funke and Femi used to go until their grandmother slapped Funke in the face for giving her a drink with the wrong hand. Funke notes how her parents only ever fight over “Dad’s heartless and ignorant Nigerian family [and] Mum’s prejudiced and ignorant English one” (12).
That night, Mum throws a house party and Funke helps her get ready. She loves Mum’s pearl necklace, which she got for her 18th birthday from her parents. Margot got an identical one, but Mum’s clasp had to be replaced by Dad after it broke. Mum promises Funke that she will pass it on to her on her 18th birthday.
All of the parties that Funke’s parents throw are the same. The Bensons arrive first, as Chloé is Mum’s best friend and her daughter, Oyinkan, is Funke’s. Then, the other wealthy white woman from Lagos arrive, all of them stay-at-home housewives. There is always one Black woman, Ndidi, who works in the medical field. The wives sit on the porch and gossip, while the husbands—all of whom studied abroad—sit and talk about their studies. Funke and Oyinkan listen as the women complain about Lagos.
The next morning, Funke, Femi, Oyinkan, and Oyinkan’s brother, Olumide, play together while they wait for their driver to pick them up. The Bensons—along with all of Funke and Femi’s friends—live on the Island, while Funke’s family lives on the campus of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH). Funke is grateful that they live at LUTH, as it has a gate surrounding it and security to keep out many of the issues of Lagos.
That Friday, Mum drives Funke and Femi to school during a tropical storm. As she drives, she talks to Femi about her end of the year art project: Bottle tops that she has collected for the students to decorate. As she looks in the mirror, she fails to see an abandoned truck by the road. She swerves, but her side of the car—with Femi behind her—slams into the truck. As bottle caps fly around the vehicle, Funke manages to grab a Guinness bottle top as she blacks out.
Funke wakes up in a hospital bed. Ndidi is there and she looks Funke all over, asking her if she has any pain. Funke tries to ask about Mum and Femi, but Ndidi ignores her, insisting that they need to go home.
At home, neighbors and friends have gathered in their house. Dad looks exhausted, and Funke realizes that her mother and Femi did not survive the crash. She “flinche[s]” when she hears Iya Nla’s voice. She tries to talk to her father, but he pushes her away.
Chloé takes Funke to her room, insisting that she did nothing wrong. She instructs Oyinkan to stay with Funke. Oyinkan speaks plainly to Funke, telling her that Mum’s side of the car went under the tanker and she and Femi died instantly. While she talks, Funke plays with the bottle cap from the crash, finding “relief” as she pushes on its sharp edges.
That night, Funke watches as Iya Nla cleans out Femi’s room, while Dad refuses to look at Funke. Funke sneaks into her parents’ room and takes her mother’s pearls, hiding them in her room. She cries herself to sleep, waiting for her father to come comfort her, but he never does.
The next week, no one takes her to school and her father does not work; instead he drinks whiskey all day. Iya Nla continues to clean the house, while Funke stays in her room or goes out to the garden. She finds Femi’s things in the garage and manages to steal a few items, like his toy and hair pick, as well as items of her mother’s and photographs from their family albums. Visitors come and go throughout the week, as Funke overhears them talking to her father about how he can have more sons and remarry.
At the end of the week, Oyinkan comes over and the two ride bicycles together. They race back to the house and when Funke wins, she celebrates, feeling relief from her grief for the first time in days. However, Iya Nla runs from the house, grabs Funke, and slaps her repeatedly. Chloé comes out and stops her, but Iya Nla insists that Funke is “possessed” because she was laughing. Dad agrees with her, shocked that she could be happy right now.
After the funerals, Chloé attempts to get Dad to care for his daughter. However, he insists that Funke should not be alive and that Femi should be instead. Funke overhears them, squeezing her bottle cap, then curls up on a chair on the veranda and covers her ears.
Chloé comes to her and tells her that she needs to get out of the house until her dad recovers. He agrees to allow her to go to England to stay with Aunt Margot. Funke protests, wanting to stay with Chloé, but Chloé insists that she needs to be with her family.
Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary: “Liv”
At The Ring, Liv plays outside to avoid being criticized by her mother—Funke’s Aunt Margot—as she is “impossible to please” (31). The postman arrives with a telegram, so she hides beneath the window to hear what it is about. She learns that her Aunt Lizzie died and her cousin, “Katherine,” is coming to live with them. Although Margot argues against it, Grandma is adamant that she will oversee caring for Katherine.
Over the next three days, Liv and her grandparents prepare for Katherine’s arrival. They decide that she will stay in the attic, so Liv excitedly gets her room ready. She gets new bedding, hangs her favorite poster on the wall, and puts fresh flowers out.
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary: “Funke”
Before Funke leaves Nigeria, her father comes to her room for the first time since the accident. He hugs her and tells her not to “forget” who she is, that “they are not better than [her]” (37). Funke begs him to let her stay, but he leaves her.
In England, Funke meets Margot at the airport. She is bothered by how different Margot is from her mother, acting rigid and cold toward Funke. Funke is confused by how Margot keeps calling her “Katherine”—her middle name that no one uses.
At The Ring, Funke is disappointed by how gray and depressing everything is. However, Liv greets her excitedly, with Funke noting how much “color” she has about her. When Liv introduces herself, Funke begins to cry.
Inside, Liv shows Funke around the house. Funke is disappointed by it all: The gray color, the wallpaper, and the uncleanliness of everything. In her attic room, Funke is only impressed by a welcome banner Liv made and the flowers she put there.
Over the next several days, Liv shows her around The Ring. Funke continues to be disappointed by everything, while missing her friends and her home in Nigeria. She learns that she does not need to talk, as Liv begins to understand her and speak for her.
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary: “Liv”
On Sunday, Liv and Funke sit by the pool while Liv’s brother, Dominic, swims. Margot comments on how Funke probably can’t swim. Dominic stands in front of Funke, taunting her that she can’t talk or swim. To Liv’s surprise, Funke shoves him into the pool. Margot angrily shouts that Funke is “wild” and “just like Lizzie” (56), as Dominic pulls Funke into the pool. Instead of swimming to the surface, she sinks, closing her eyes. Liv jumps in and pulls Funke out and is surprised to see that Funke is “disappointed” when she is saved. As Grandpa and Liv yell at Dominic, Margot continues to shout about how “uncivilized” Funke is.
Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary: “Funke”
Funke is furious at her aunt’s use of the word “uncivilized.” She thinks of The Ring and wonders how they could ever think that she was the one that was uncivilized. As Liv tries to comfort her, Funke realizes that Liv thinks she is stupid, too. She angrily grabs Dominic’s Rubik’s cube, solving it in just a few minutes, then sets it down on the table. Liv is delighted that she is smart enough, but then messes up the cube—insisting that she can’t let Funke “show Dominic up” or Margot will become “spiteful” (59).
That night, Funke refuses to go to dinner. She thinks of how much she misses Nigeria, Mum, and Femi. She squeezes her bottle cap so tight that it makes her palm bleed, but she continues to squeeze.
When Liv comes up, Funke speaks for the first time, telling Liv that she wants to go home. Liv grabs her hands and finds the wound from her bottle cap. Funke explains that, when she squeezes it, it stops her heart from hurting. Liv insists that next time Funke tell her when she’s hurt, and she can hug Liv instead. Funke tentatively agrees. Funke then tells Liv her real name, and the two go into the kitchen for food.
The next morning, Margot, Grandpa, and Dominic leave for London for the week. At lunch, Liv asks Funke if her family is poor. Funke insists that they are not, explaining about her private school, service staff, and food.
That Friday, when Liv’s family gets home, Funke greets them and does her best to be polite. Aunt Margot dismisses her, and Dominic brushes past her into the house. When Liv refers to her as “Funke,” Margot insists that she be called “Katherine” while she’s in England. Funke looks to Liv and Grandma to support her, but they both agree that Katherine Stone is a better name.
Saturday morning, Funke realizes that she needs to take the plaits out of her hair. Liv helps her, but it only causes her hair to become frizzy despite Liv’s effort to brush it. When they go downstairs, Aunt Margot insists that her hair can’t look like that, forcing Funke to put it into a ponytail.
Funke spends the rest of the afternoon in her room until Liv’s friend, Jojo, comes to her room. Funke thinks that she may be in love with him, remembering her father’s stories of the first time he saw Funke’s mother. When Jojo calls her Kate, she realizes that she doesn’t mind the name that much, deciding that it may be “the way to fit in” (69).
Part 1, Chapter 6 Summary: “Liv”
The week before school starts, Margot takes Liv and Kate to buy uniforms for school. Liv attends Woodleigh Abbey—which they refer to as “Wooders”—and she assumes that Kate will go, too. However, Margot insists that the school is not a place for Kate and tells her that she will be going to Downsview Comprehensive.
That night, Liv finds Kate in her room looking at photos of her family. She sees the beautiful parties they attended and how different Kate’s mom was from her own—wearing fancy clothing, dancing, and having fun. She had thought that Kate had been exaggerating her life in Lagos, but now realizes how much better things look than in England. She tells Kate that she wishes she lived there, and Kate agrees that she does, too.
Part 1, Chapter 7 Summary: “Kate”
Kate lies in bed on her 10th birthday, crying and feeling more homesick than she has before. Liv surprises her by coming into her room with a card and two presents—sweets and a pair of bell-bottoms that don’t fit her anymore. The card has a drawing of Kate as a mermaid—a mami wata—with a beautiful tail, an afro, and even Kate’s dimples. The gifts make Kate feel “loved” for “the first time since Mum had died” (77).
That afternoon, Kate, Jojo, and Liv sit by the pool and listen to music. As they dance and sing, Kate realizes that The Ring is finally feeling like a “home.” She decides that she is going to do everything that she can to “survive” and to become “a Stone they’d be proud of” (79).
Part 1 Analysis
The novel utilizes a shifting, limited third-person point of view that alternates between Funke and Liv’s perspective. The narration provides insight into how the two protagonists feel, showing Funke’s homesickness and Liv’s excitement over Funke’s arrival, as well as how uncomfortable she feels around her own mother. However, because the perspective is limited, these young girls are also the reader’s only source of background information or knowledge about the broader world of the novel. As a result, the reader gleans information about things like each family’s wealth, Margot and Lizzie’s history, and Margot’s feelings about Funke’s presence through the conversations and observations of these two young girls.
After Funke loses her mother and brother, the theme of The Importance of Support in Surviving Trauma is introduced. Each time she is overwhelmed by grief, memories, or her rapidly changing life, she grips the bottlecap from the car accident to feel physical pain that replaces her emotional pain, with the cap becoming an important symbol of her struggles and grief. She spends weeks not speaking at The Ring, failing to adapt to her new life due to the overwhelming grief she feels from her trauma. However, as she slowly befriends Liv and accepts that she will be forced to stay in London, she decides to assimilate the best that she can. Her relationship with Liv becomes a key component in her acceptance of and, ultimately, survival in her new life.
During her time at The Ring, Funke also grapples with The Interplay Between Prejudice and Privilege, a theme which is introduced through the mirroring of both characters and location. Funke and Liv’s lives before they are together mirror each other: They both have wealthy families and what they would consider nice homes, living on estates with guards and service staff and attending private schools. However, they both also hold prejudice toward each other, emphasizing their perceived privileges. Funke is shocked by the state of The Ring, with its lack of color and rundown conditions. She also criticizes the food that Liv’s family eats, the way they bathe, and the lack of attentiveness of the service staff.
Similarly, Liv and her family assume Funke is impoverished based solely on the fact that she is from Nigeria. Liv expresses her shock after seeing photos of Funke’s home, noting the “massive” pool, how life is “so much more colorful than life in Somerset,” and, ultimately, how she “wish[es] [she] lived in Nigeria” (75). Their mirrored reactions to each other—judgment of their lives, prejudice against their homes, and their shock at discovering the other’s wealth and privilege—introduce the idea that privilege can create skewed perceptions, often coupled with a prejudicial judgment of others.
Margot and Lizzie serve as foils to each other in the text to emphasize the differences between Funke’s life in Nigeria and in London. The two are sisters, both raised at The Ring, and both share the same pearl necklace which symbolize their connection and their family’s affluence. However, when Funke first sees her Aunt Margot, she notes, “The woman had Mum’s voice and Mum’s pearls but in every other way she was her opposite. Her skin was beige like cassava […] her lips were thin and bare [and] dark woven fabric covered her like an armchair” (38).
Although Lizzie’s presence in the novel was brief, she had a kind and caring nature, arguing against her friends in defense of Ndidi and insisting that even the service staff call her by her first name. In stark contrast, Margot is cold and bitter, harboring years of resentment towards her sister and treating Funke as if she is “half savage” (34). The differences between the two mothers in the novel emphasize Funke’s feelings of unbelonging and introduce the motif of home as a construct. Although Funke has a physical “home” in both locations, it is her mother’s kindness and caring that gives her a sense of belonging.
Funke’s experiences in these chapters also introduce the theme of Self-Identity Amid Cultural Dislocation. After Funke decides to adapt to life in The Ring and make the best of it, two important elements of her identity are stripped away: Her name and her hair. After her conversation with Jojo, she realizes that “Funke made sense in Lagos but maybe it didn’t work here? Maybe Grandpa was right. Maybe becoming Kate was the way to fit in” (69). From that point forward, Funke’s point-of-view chapters are labeled “Kate,” reflecting her decision to change who she is to fit in. Similarly, Funke’s hair also reflects her journey of belonging: After a week of keeping her hair in the braids she got in Lagos, she is forced to wash it, which leaves her unable to plait it again. She now changes her hair style into a simple ponytail. Facing the ignorance and poorly veiled racism of her new family, she is forced to change her identity and appearance to reflect her physical movement into a new culture.
