The ‘Ones We Find’ is a book written by Ama Pomaa, a Ghanaian author and engineer. Ama Pomaa was the first-prize winner at the 2018 GAW Literary Awards. Her work centers around inspirational fiction, social constructs, struggles of faith, and mystery.
Synopsis
The story is about a young woman, Marylin Tagoe, who suddenly loses her friend, Femi Ozuechi, and is convinced that he was murdered. As the plot unravels, hidden secrets of particular characters in the book are uncovered. The heroine gets to find out things related and unrelated to herself. She battles her demons at home and is finally able to find Femi’s murderer, through courage and faith in herself.
A brief look at the plot
At home, the relationship Marylin has with her husband is unstable. It had been this way since the day he found out that she had had sexual partners before him. This reveal was worsened by the fact that she had a child when she was fifteen years old. Marylin had hidden this secret child for a long time. She had consistently told people that the child, Hannah, was her cousin and her aunty’s daughter. Marylin planned on keeping it a secret forever, and the marriage proposal of her husband, Cyril, made her more determined to do so.
Unfortunately, the secret came out the day before her wedding.
For a year after her wedding, Marylin and her husband slept in different bedrooms and were more like roommates. She kept trying to make her marriage work and felt inferior in her own marital home. This was because she saw her husband as a savior, and herself as someone men would settle for. She was even willing to sacrifice her relationship with her daughter to keep her marriage.
Marylin’s life is a continual struggle
Outside her home, her life went from struggling to keep her marriage afloat to solving the death of her friend. A friend who she believed did not die a natural death. She battles between workplace politics and trying to keep the image of Femi clean. She begins to doubt Femi, as she delves into his life, finding out secrets that he had kept from her for years.
Marylin begins to realise that there is a reason why the people we idolise should remain distant. This is because everyone is flawed no matter how perfect they may seem. She further realises that the perfect family image he had created all those years was in shambles. His wife did not love him, never invited him to bed, and was open about her extramarital affairs with him. What broke the camel’s back was when he found out that his children, for whom he had sacrificed so much, were not his.
The people Marylin suspected of his murder consistently changed as she continued to dig deeper into the life of Femi, until the ending when the character that was least expected, who seemed to have no ties to Femi, ended up being the murderer.
Character review
Throughout the entire novel, Ama develops each of the characters without fail – and as one keeps reading, each character stays true to his or her core values. Even Femi, who began to seem imperfect, remained the disciplined guy who was good until his death. Alex, her boss, kept being the selfish man who would sacrifice anyone for his gain, and her mother also remained the woman who felt subdued by societal standards, and kept pushing the burden onto her daughter even till the end.
Book themes
The issue of social constructs and societal standards seemed to be a theme that ran from the beginning of the story until the end. Marylin was forced to marry and stay in the marriage with a man who did not see her the same anymore. Likely, this was because she felt she was tainted, and was privileged to have Cyril and his supposedly good family choose her to be his partner. This is a vivid example of the burden of societal standards and social constructs.
Another example is her mother, Christina Baidoo, staying in her marriage with a man who was a ‘bozo’. He was feeding off of her mother because she also felt privileged to be chosen by him.
Naomi Abugri is another character who was also a victim of the burden of social constructs. Naomi was described as problematic and crazy at her workplace, only because she was vocal about being cheated out of a promotion she deserved. A promotion that was later given to a man twice. Marylin did not like Naomi from the beginning. However, when she also was tricked and not given a promotion that was promised to her, she began to realise the realities of office politics. She also understood why Naomi was the way she was.
The issue of the burden of social constructs is one not to be overlooked. As it involves the lives of people and has even worked its way into the church. This was pointed out by Liza, Marylin’s best friend, after visiting the church and noticing how judgemental even the Pastor and Elders were.
Further observations (spoilers below!)
Another focus of the book showed that people are not always what they seem. David Nouah, who seemed like a gentleman and sometimes the confidante of Marylin, turned out to be the murderer of Femi. One could say that Marylin trusted him, but mostly because he seemed to have no ties to Femi. It was ironic considering that Marylin was investigating the murder of Femi, while he was right under her nose. The connection he had to Femi was Adelaide Twumasi, who had a close relationship with Femi and loved him romantically. David was the ex-husband of Adelaide, who had been violent towards her and who had tried to kill her when she brought up the topic of divorce. Another example is how Femi and Marylin seemed flawless to other people when their marriage was far from perfect.
In conclusion
Ama Pomaa is a brilliant and creative author, who was able to combine the issues of society with mystery while giving us a good read. The story and plot make you question almost everything about life. It helps you to think, and finally, at the end, it also helps you realise that life is beautiful and that we do not have to sacrifice ourselves to enjoy it. The Ones We Find is an amazing book. I hope more people will grab a copy and journey with the characters and plot just as I did.
This is beautiful, Maud.
Thank you 😊