Book Talk: The Tiny Things Are Heavier with Esther Ifesinachi Okonkwo

Join us as we welcome debut novelist Esther Ifesinachi Okonkwo, author of our December Book Club pick The Tiny Things Are Heavier, to discuss her book on Thursday, December 11 at 7:15 P.M.! Esther will be joined in conversation with Chicago-based poet Itiola "I.S." Jones!

Book club discussion of The Tiny Things Are Heavier will take place at 6:45 P.M., and the author talk will begin at 7:15 P.M.!

All are welcome to either or both parts of this event, and you do not need to have read the book to attend the book talk!

--

About the Book

Named a Best Book of 2025 by Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Forbes.

"A gracefully told and sharply observed debut." -Kiley Reid, New York Times bestselling author of Such a Fun Age

A heart-rending debut novel about a Nigerian immigrant as she tries to find her place at home and in America-a powerful epic about love, grief, family, and belonging.

The Tiny Things Are Heavier follows Sommy, a Nigerian woman who comes to the United States for graduate school two weeks after her brother, Mezie, attempts suicide. Plagued by the guilt of leaving Mezie behind, Sommy struggles to fit into her new life as a student and an immigrant. Lonely and homesick, Sommy soon enters a complicated relationship with her boisterous Nigerian roommate, Bayo, a relationship that plummets into deceit when Sommy falls for Bryan, a biracial American, whose estranged Nigerian father left the States immediately after his birth. Bonded by their feelings of unbelonging and a vague sense of kinship, Sommy and Bryan transcend the challenges of their new relationship.

During summer break, Sommy and Bryan visit the bustling city of Lagos, Nigeria, where Sommy hopes to reconcile with Mezie and Bryan plans to connect with his father. But when a shocking and unexpected event throws their lives into disarray, it exposes the cracks in Sommy's relationships and forces her to confront her notions of self and familial love.

A daring and ambitious novel rendered in stirring, tender prose, The Tiny Things Are Heavier is a captivating portrait that explores the hardships of migration, the subtleties of Nigeria's class system, and how far we'll go to protect those we love.

Esther Ifesinachi Okonkwo is the author of The Tiny Things are Heavier, which Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Forbes named a Best Book of 2025. She holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop and a PhD from Florida State University, and is currently an Assistant Professor of English and African and African American Studies at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. Her fiction has appeared in Hypertext Magazine, Isele Magazine, VQR, and Guernica. She’s a recipient of a 2021 Elizabeth George Foundation Grant and the 2024 Torch Literary Fellowship.

I.S. Jones is the author of Bloodmercy, chosen by Nicole Sealey as the winner of the 2025 APR / Honickman First Book Prize and the chapbook Spells of My Name, selected by Newfound in 2021 for their Emerging Writers Series. Her works have appeared in Granta, LA Review of Books, Guernica, Prairie Schooner, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. While she has lived in many places across the U.S., she gratefully calls Chicago home.