Stay With Me: Chapter One

‘I love this book… A vital, fresh moving debut.’ – Tessa Ross, 2017 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction Chair of Judges

Over the coming weeks leading up to the announcement of the 2017 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction winner, we’ll be spotlighting each of this year’s shortlisted books. This week, why not lose yourself in Ayobami Adebayo’s incredible debut Stay With Me?

Yejide is hoping for a miracle, for a child. It is all her husband wants, all her mother-in-law wants, and she has tried everything – arduous pilgrimages, medical consultations, appeals to God. But when her relatives insist upon a new wife, it is too much for Yejide to bear. It will lead to jealousy, betrayal and despair.

CHAPTER ONE

I must leave this city today and come to you. My bags are packed and the empty rooms remind me that I should have left a week ago. Musa, my driver, has slept at the security guard’s post every night since last Friday, waiting for me to wake him up at dawn so we can set out on time. But my bags still sit in the living room, gathering dust.

I have given most of what I acquired here – furniture, elec- tronic devices, even house fittings – to the stylists who worked in my salon. So, every night for a week now, I’ve tossed about on this bed without a television to shorten my insomniac hours.

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