Characters Cursed Daughters Oyinkan Braithwaite

Monife Falodun: The Cursed Daughter Whose Death Sets the Story in Motion

Overview

Monife Falodun, known to her family as Mo, is the tragic cousin whose suicide by drowning at Elegushi Beach opens Cursed Daughters. She is the daughter of Bunmi, a descendant of the cursed Feranmi, making her the latest victim of the Falodun family curse. Though she dies early, her presence haunts every page: her death is the emotional catalyst that drives her cousin Ebun's investigation into the curse and forces other Falodun women to confront their inherited fate. Monife represents both the curse's most visible casualty and a warning about the suffocating power of superstition.

Plot Role

Monife's primary function in the narrative is to die, but her role extends far beyond that single event. The Prologue places the reader inside her consciousness as she wades into the ocean, remembering her former carefree swims and trying to block out thoughts of Golden Boy, the man whose betrayal she cannot survive. This intimate perspective forces readers to experience her despair directly, making her a fully realized character rather than a mere plot device.

Her death triggers the entire investigation into the curse. Ebun attends her funeral in Chapter I and silently argues with their mother's claim that Monife felt loved, believing instead that love killed her. Throughout later chapters, Monife's story is told in flashback, revealing her relationship with Kalu Kenosi (Golden Boy), her painful encounters with his mother, and her slow decline after his marriage to Amara. The epilogue ultimately resolves the curse through Eniiyi's symbolic fight, but Monife's death remains the proof that the curse is real—and deadly.

Motivations and Traits Shown Through Actions

Monife is driven by a desperate need for love and validation, a trait she shares with many Falodun women. Her actions reveal a personality that is both bold and fragile:

  • Assertiveness: At the house party in Chapter VII, she approaches Kalu without hesitation, flirts openly, and leads him to an outbuilding for a kiss, dismissing her boyfriend as her "soon-to-be ex."
  • Vulnerability: When Kalu's mother belittles her at the café in Chapter X, Monife defends her love but ultimately walks out trembling, unable to withstand the humiliation.
  • Obsessiveness: In Chapter IX, she cannot sleep, fixates on Kalu's dinner date with Amara, and presses him for uncomfortable details, revealing her deep insecurity.
  • Self-destructive depression: After learning of Kalu's engagement, she stops eating for three days (Chapter 77), and her earlier episodes of insomnia and withdrawal—observed by Ebun in Chapter V—show a pre-existing pattern of depressive collapse.

Monife's courage and fear coexist. She is bold enough to pursue Kalu but too fragile to survive the loss. Her final act—suicide—is a tragic assertion of agency, even as it fulfills the curse's prophecy.

Chronological Arc

Monife's story is told out of sequence, but a clear arc emerges:

  1. Childhood and arrival in Nigeria: She and her brother Tolu move from England to the Falodun house after their father abandons them. Ebun describes her as a "candle in the perpetual gloom" (Chapter V).
  2. Relationship with Kalu: They meet at a party, date for about a year, and she meets his disapproving mother.
  3. The café confrontation: Kalu's mother lists Monife's faults and pushes for Amara; Monife walks out.
  4. Kalu's marriage to Amara: He marries Amara while Monife is still in love. She learns the news and spirals into depression.
  5. Suicide: On January 8, 1996 (the day of Kalu's wedding), she drowns herself at Elegushi Beach, leaving a brief note.
  6. Posthumous presence: Her memory drives Ebun's quest and remains central to the reincarnation and identity themes explored later.

Relationships

Ebun (Cousin and Confidante)

Monife and Ebun share the deepest relationship in the book. When Monife arrives at the Falodun house, she transforms Ebun's lonely existence. She teaches Ebun to value her skin, provides her first sanitary pad, and confides in her about the curse. In turn, Ebun becomes Monife's witness and caretaker during depressive episodes. After Monife's death, Ebun becomes the story's central investigator, driven by guilt and love.

Kalu Kenosi (Golden Boy)

Kalu is both Monife's great love and her undoing. Their relationship begins with passionate flirtation, but his mother's manipulation and his own weakness destroy it. He allows his mother to arrange a meeting with Amara, and though he claims to love Monife, he marries Amara shortly after. The evidence in Chapter 98 explicitly states: "the golden boy lost his innocence, the cousin lost her honour, the girl lost her will to live." Monife's hope that her death will break his heart suggests she saw his betrayal as the curse's final triumph.

Bunmi (Mother)

Monife's mother Bunmi is a product of the curse herself. After her husband chose a mistress, Bunmi returned to the Falodun house with her children. The relationship between mother and daughter is strained: Monife feels that love killed her, and her mother's inability to protect her from the curse's pattern is a source of mother-daughter conflict.

Tolu (Brother)

Tolu appears primarily as a sullen presence at the funeral, maintaining distance from their father. The outline suggests he carries his own trauma from abandonment, but his relationship with Monife is largely unexplored, leaving room for interpretation about his grief.

Key Decisions and Consequences

  • Decision to pursue Kalu: Monife actively courts Golden Boy at the party, discarding her boyfriend. This choice brings her the intense love she craves but also exposes her to his mother's cruelty.
  • Decision to trust Kalu after the dinner date: When Kalu tells her about driving Amara home, Monife suppresses her unease. This trust proves misplaced; Kalu eventually marries Amara.
  • Decision to stop eating after the engagement news: She refuses food for three days (Chapter 77), reflecting a pattern of self-harm that echoes other Falodun women like Fikayo (Chapter 17), who also willed death.
  • Decision to commit suicide: The Prologue shows her choosing the water, leaving a note, and hoping Kalu's heart will break. This act is both a surrender to the curse and a final assertion of control.

Themes and Symbols

The Falodun Family Curse

Monife is the curse's most direct victim. The curse, originating from Feranmi's first wife, declares that "daughters will pursue men, but the men will be like water in their palms." Monife's relentless pursuit of Kalu—even after rejection—exemplifies this. The Falodun family curse is not merely superstition; it manifests as real suffering.

Reincarnation and Identity

Monife is described as a "mermaid-like figure" in the Prologue, linking her to the water imagery that reappears in Eniiyi's epilogue. This connection suggests that Monife's spirit is part of the ongoing cycle the curse perpetuates, and that reincarnation and identity are central to breaking free.

Generational Trauma

Every Falodun woman in the family tree suffers from generational trauma: Bunmi, Kemi, Afoke, Fikayo, and Monife. Monife's depression, her inability to sustain a healthy relationship, and her suicide are the tragic culmination of centuries of inherited pain.

Autonomy versus Superstition

Monife's death raises the question of whether she was truly cursed or simply believed herself to be. When young Ebun says she doesn't believe in curses, Monife replies: "That's fine, but what if the curse believes in you?" This line captures the theme of autonomy versus superstition. Monife's belief in the curse may have been as potent as any supernatural force.

Questions and Answers

  1. Why does Monife commit suicide?
    Monife drowns herself because Kalu Kenosi marries Amara, confirming her deepest fear that she cannot escape the family curse. She sees her death as both an ending of pain and a final attempt to wound Kalu, hoping "his heart will break."

  2. Does Monife believe in the curse?
    Yes. She tells Ebun the story of Feranmi and explicitly warns that the curse can "believe" in you even if you don't believe in it. Her actions—especially her obsessive attachment to Kalu—suggest she internalized the curse's prophecy.

  3. How does Monife's relationship with Ebun shape the story?
    Monife becomes Ebun's surrogate older sister and confidante. After Monife's death, Ebun is the one who seeks answers and eventually helps break the curse, honoring the love she received from Monife.

  4. What role does Kalu's mother play in Monife's fate?
    Mrs. Kenosi actively sabotages the relationship by belittling Monife, pushing Amara, and arranging the marriage. She embodies the "wicked queen" of Monife's fairy tale, as described in Chapter 98.

  5. Is Monife's death inevitable, or could she have survived?
    The text suggests that Monife had the same pattern of depressive episodes before meeting Kalu. Her decision to starve herself and later drown reflects a long-standing fragility. While the curse is a narrative force, her personal vulnerability makes her death feel tragically avoidable but deeply consistent with her character.