Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani Quotes

I Do Not Come To You By Chance is set in the world of Nigeria’s 419 scammers. It was a world I was very familiar with having grown up in South East­ern Nigeria. There were lots of people, lots of young men I knew who were going to, who were 419 scammers. So I wanted to write a story of how people from good homes, people from the kind of home I came from could become international financial terror­ists.

Being the opara of the family, Kingsley Ibe is entitled to certain privileges — a piece of meat in his egusi soup, a party to celebrate his graduation from university. As first son, he has responsibilities, too. But times are bad in Nigeria, and life is hard.

He brought out an it-was-white handkerchief from his trouser pocket and wiped the sweat from his brows.

I spit out everything onto the page, from beginning to end, and then go back and edit. I’m one of those people who like to tick off things on my to-do list; so, it helps me psychologically to get to the end first, and then settle down to revise.

Unconditional family support may be the way in Nigeria, but when Kingsley turns to his Uncle Boniface for help, he learns that charity may come with strings attached.

Although his position on the family tree could not be described in anything less than seven sentences, Odinkemmelu was introduced to us as our cousin.

For much of his young life, Kingsley believed that education was everything, that through wisdom, all things were possible. Now he worries that without a 'long-leg' — someone who knows someone who can help him — his degrees will do nothing but adorn the walls of his parents' low-rent house.

At age seven, when it was confirmed that her right hand could reach across her head and touch her left ear, Augustina moved back to her father’s house and started attending primary school. Being long and skinny had worked to her advantage.

My father was a walking encyclopedia, and he flipped his pages with the zeal and precision of a magician.

It would have to be one of those dangerous pieces of advice that people dish out all over the place. A particularly popular one is: Follow your heart. What if the person’s heart is leading them into a dungeon of doom? What if the person’s heart is filled with foolishness? ‘Follow your heart’ is not just unwise counsel; it is a recipe for anarchy. Imagine a world where each of us followed our heart to wherever it led us, without caring for the people around us or the laws of the land.

When a tragedy befalls his family, Kingsley learns the hardest lesson of all: education may be the language of success in Nigeria, but it's money that does the talking.

My tender triceps started grumbling

Dear Friend, I do not come to you by chance. Upon my quest for a trusted and reliable foreign business man or company I was given your contact by the Nigerian chamber of Commerce and Industry, I hope that you can be trusted to handle a transaction of this magnitude.

Make una come see o, Graveyard don begin dey use perfume.

Boniface — aka Cash Daddy — is an exuberant character who suffers from elephantiasis of the pocket. He's also rumored to run a successful empire of email scams. But he can help. With Cash Daddy's intervention, Kingsley and his family can be as safe as a tortoise in its shell.