ABUJA — At the launch of Love Through the Eyes of a Village Boy on Friday night, the room was filled with laughter, but one story stood out as the defining moment of the evening.
During an intimate Q&A session at the Dunadura Restaurant, an audience member asked the author, Serial Creative Adetimilehin “Vic’Adex” Inioluwa, how his background as a “Village Boy” shaped his view on love.
Vic’Adex’s answer was not a philosophical treatise, but a confession of a childhood heartbreak that had the audience roaring.
The “Fast” Education and the Fatal Letter “I had a ‘fast’ Nigerian education,” Vic’Adex explained to the packed room. “By the time I was in SS3, I was only 13 years old. But in my mind, I was a senior. I was a man.”
Feeling the pressure of his peers who were 17 and 18, the young poet decided it was time to find love. He set his sights on a student in JSS3—a girl who was roughly 12 years old. To his 13-year-old mind, the age gap was appropriate.
“I wrote her a love letter,” he recalled, shaking his head. “I poured out my heart. I was expecting romance.”
The Reply That Changed Everything The reply came the next day. It wasn’t a rejection. It wasn’t a “yes.” It was a condemnation.
“She wrote back to me,” Vic’Adex said, pausing for effect. “And she called me a Destiny Destroyer.”
The audience erupted in laughter, but the author used the moment to pivot to a deeper truth about the environment he grew up in.
“At the time, it hurt me deeply,” he admitted. “But looking back now, her response was the best it could have been. She was a young girl in a Catholic school. Our parents and teachers constantly warned us that boys were distractions, that teenage pregnancy ended futures. To her, my letter wasn’t affection—it was a threat to her education.”
From Heartbreak to Art This intersection of innocence, fear, and misunderstanding is the core of his new collection, Love Through the Eyes of a Village Boy.
The book captures that specific brand of “Village Boy” naivety—where love is vast and terrifying, where intentions are misunderstood, and where a 13-year-old boy can be branded a villain for trying to write a romance.
“That naivety is what I wanted to capture,” Vic’Adex told the audience. “We fumble through love. We get it wrong. But we grow.”
For the readers who picked up a copy of the book—including the first copy sold for a record-breaking 1 million Naira—the story served as a reminder: before he was a celebrated Strategist and Poet, Vic’Adex was just a boy trying not to destroy anyone’s destiny.
Love Through the Eyes of a Village Boy is available now.
