Tuner of Silences

A RADIO FRANCE-CULTURE/TLRAMA BEST WORK OF FICTIONBY THE WINNER OF THE 2013 CAMES PRIZEAND THE WINNER OF THE 2014 NEUSTADT PRIZEQuite unlike anything else I have read from Africa."e;"e;Doris LessingBy meshing the richness of African beliefs . . . into the Western framework of the novel, he creates a mysterious and surreal epic.Henning MankellMwanito was eleven when he saw a woman for the first time, and the sight so surprised him he burst into tears. Mwanito has been living in a former big-game park for eight years. The only people he knows are his father, his brother, an uncle, and a servant. Hes been told that the rest of the world is dead, that all roads are sad, that they wait for an apology from God. In the place his father calls Jezoosalem, Mwanito has been told that crying and praying are the same thing. Both, it seems, are forbidden.The eighth novel by the internationally bestselling Mia Couto, The Tuner of Silences is the story of Mwanitos struggle to reconstruct a family history that his father is unable to discuss. With the young womans arrival in Jezoosalem, however, the silence of the past quickly breaks down, and both his fathers story and the world are heard once more.The Tuner of Silences has been published to acclaim in more than half a dozen countries. Now in its first English translation, this story of an African boy's quest for the truth endures as a magical, humanizing confrontation between one child and the legacy of war.PRAISE FOR MIA COUTOOn almost every page we sense Coutos delight in those places where language slips officialdoms asphyxiating grasp.The New York Times"e;Even in translation, his prose is suffused with striking images.The Washington PostPRAISE FOR DAVID BROOKSHAW"e;David Brookshaw dexterously renders the novel's often colloquial, pithy Portuguese into lively English. Brookshaw's task is made more exacting by the particular quality of Couto's brilliance.The New York Times