This long novel was one of the best that I've read in 2016. Abraham Verghese's medical knowledge definitely shows up in his words, but so does his humanity. The conjoined twin brothers of Marion and Shiva will touch your heart and the rich, flowing river of descriptive words that Abraham weaves into this first novel will keep you glued to this book until the end - even with 541 pages to read.
You will probably end up picking sides between the brothers. That is just human nature, but along the way you will be left with a full and lasting impression of Ethiopia and the humanity of the brothers. The story of Thomas Stone and Sister Mary Joseph Praise will end and begin this novel but the middle is all about the boys. The twin sons, Shiva and Marion, who are orphaned when their mother dies in childbirth and their father disappears were separated at birth by the tissue that connected their heads. Raised by the unlikely couple of Hema and Ghosh, who eventually marry, the boys explore the grounds of Missing Hospital where they live. Hema and Ghosh both grow into their new roles of parenthood by being thrust into the job with the surprise birth of the boys, but they mostly learn how to make a family.
As the boys grow up with their doctor parents and family of friends at Missing, they learn how the world works inside their Missing compound and in their country of Ethiopia. Marion studies medicine at Ghosh's side from a small boy and up and eventually attends medical school. Shiva is brilliant and drawn to the study of pregnancy and childbirth. He wants to make the tortuous side effects of pregnancy in underdeveloped nations safer for the women involved.
During the rebellion to overthrow the king by one of his bodyguards who is a close friend of the family, Marion leaves to avoid arrest. He and Shiva have grown apart from their all most inseparability as children. They have an argument over the attentions of a playmate who was their third wheel growing up, Genet. This leaves the brothers estranged and living in different countries when Marion leaves to pursue his medical training in America.
There is so much more to this book than I can put in one blog posting. The detail of the writing and the descriptions of their childhood home will jump off of the page. Read this one and let me know how you liked the ending.
Where has the time gone? April has flown by and finished itself out without me. Sometimes it feels like you can not breath because life is not giving you a chance to slow down. You are rushing to and fro and never catching up. This month we traveled for work out of town for a week and then made the big move. This weekend we moved our daughter into her first apartment after college.
Watching her make her own life decisions sometimes made me so proud that I could cry for the little girl she used to be. It's always hard to watch your children grow up and especially hard to watch them go out into the big world on their own. You want them to succeed and never have a moment's worry, but life does not work like that. We just have to remember that as they take a misstep here or there, it creates a life lesson for them that hopefully they will not repeat. They are learning the things that work for themselves and how to operate in this world on their own. But at the same time, you just want to protect them and keep them from all harm. You want to put a protective bubble around them to keep all the bad things away. If only we could do that.
I'm sure my parents felt the same way when I went off to college and never returned home to live. They would get the tearful calls, begging for help with something or the other, or receive the calls that meant I was just lonely and wanted to hear their voices. Those calls will probably come in the future from our girl, but if not that will be a good thing. That way we will know our little girl is happy and making her own path in this life. We want to provide her with a safety net so she can make mistakes, but know that we are here to back her up. After much worry, I think we have learned that this approach is not always the best. It doesn't seem to be stopping us though.
I was only able to read two books the entire month. Of course, one of them was all most 600 pages long. Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese is well worth the time and effort
to read. His writing will drop you right into the muggy, complicated world of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and the lives of Shiva and Marion along with their family. My book club had a lively, and interesting discussion of this book, so please look for my full review in the future. That's the future where I can breath again and write again. May you new month start off a lot quieter than mine, but with the joy knowing that your hard work to raise your children will help them take those steps to their own lives.
