The Memory of Love

Aminatta Forna has established herself as one of the most breathtaking writers out of Africa today, winning readers' hearts and critical acclaim; Vanity Fair named her one of the continent's most promising writers. Now, in The Memory of Love, she evokes the haunting atmosphere of a country at war in powerful story of two generations of African life.

In contemporary Sierra Leone, a devastating civil war has left an entire populace with terrible secrets to keep. In the capital hospital, Kai, a gifted young surgeon is plagued by demons that are beginning to threaten his livelihood. Elsewhere in the hospital lies Elias Coke, a man who was young during the country's turbulent postcolonial years and has stories to tell that are far from heroic. As past and present intersect in the buzzing city, Kai and Elias are drawn unwittingly closer by Adrian, a British psychologist with good intentions, and into the path of one woman at the center of their stories.

The Memory of Love is a book that captures the complexities of modern Africa, in which vivid glimpses of lingering trauma - the woman in a dream-state wanders hundreds of miles from home; the man who panics at the smell of meat cooking - coexist with evidence of the persistence of hope; the crippled man rebuilding his body in order to become a husband. With rare wisdom Forna captures the blurred lines between good intentions and practical action, the indelible effects of the past and, at the end of it all, the very nature of love. (jacket)