The Ghosts of Eden
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| |||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in The Ghosts of Eden for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
Product Description
Review
'The delight is in the detail of this book. It brought to me pictures of Uganda and that feeling you always had there of life beyond this life, whispering, beckoning, interfering. Reality and myths reinforce each other as the title suggests and you are left feeling the vulnerability of humanity' --Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
'This deeply moving book will leave you thoughtful for long after you have read it' --Ann Widdecombe MP
'Grips the reader. A stunningly haunting debut' --Lesley Mason, the Book Bag
'This deeply moving book will leave you thoughtful for long after you have read it' --Ann Widdecombe MP
'Grips the reader. A stunningly haunting debut' --Lesley Mason, the Book Bag
Product Description
This is a superb epic about love, medicine and cultural identities with a huge African and European cast which concludes on the shores of the Indian ocean. Michael Lacey, the child of missionaries, and Zachye Katura, tending cattle for his father in the grasslands of Kaaro Karungi, are happy in their childhood idyll. However, the world around them is changing, propelling them towards tragedy. Haunted by grief and guilt, they grow up severed from their families and ancestral heritage. When they both fall for the same enigmatic woman they must face their past and hear their ancestors if they are to make their way in the modern world. This is a cross-cultural, cross-racial love story with a spectacular East African setting and contemporary worldwide themes of the effects of rapid cultural change.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The Ghosts of Eden follows the lives of two children growing up in Uganda. Micheal is the child of missionaries and the book begins with him battling against claustrophobia on his first flight back to Uganda since he left to study medicine. He is finally distracted from his fear, when the passenger in the seat next to him dies.
Zachye lives in rural Uganda, where he helps his brother, Stanley, look after the family's cattle. Zachye's father dreams of a better life for his sons, and so arranges for them to be sent to school. The book touches on how the introduction of technology to the country changes their lives. Their observations of new objects were fascinating to me, and I loved seeing them learn how to use things which we take for granted.
The first half of the book concentrates on the lives of the two very different boys growing up in East Africa, and is one of the best pieces of writing about life as a child I have seen. I was captivated by their innocent view of the world, and loved their childish banter. The author perfectly captures the minds of the two boys, and to be able to do this convincingly with two completely different cultures is an outstanding achievement.
The Ghosts of Eden also reveals much about the superstitions and spirit world of the African people. Although I have read a few books which have contained this subject before (most notably Ben Okri's The Famished Road) This is the first book in which I have been made to understand their belief system, and not just been confused by it.
Unfortunately, the book goes downhill a bit in the middle section. The lives of the boys as adults did not interest me anywhere near as much as that of their childhood. In fact, I didn't like either of them very much when they meet for the first time, and fall in love with the same woman. Luckily the plot held my attention, and the ending was good enough to make up for the minor lapse of the middle section.
I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to read about African culture, without battling with symbolism or the endless horrors of war. It is a beautifully written story, and I think it has just become my favourite book with an African setting.
Zachye lives in rural Uganda, where he helps his brother, Stanley, look after the family's cattle. Zachye's father dreams of a better life for his sons, and so arranges for them to be sent to school. The book touches on how the introduction of technology to the country changes their lives. Their observations of new objects were fascinating to me, and I loved seeing them learn how to use things which we take for granted.
The first half of the book concentrates on the lives of the two very different boys growing up in East Africa, and is one of the best pieces of writing about life as a child I have seen. I was captivated by their innocent view of the world, and loved their childish banter. The author perfectly captures the minds of the two boys, and to be able to do this convincingly with two completely different cultures is an outstanding achievement.
The Ghosts of Eden also reveals much about the superstitions and spirit world of the African people. Although I have read a few books which have contained this subject before (most notably Ben Okri's The Famished Road) This is the first book in which I have been made to understand their belief system, and not just been confused by it.
Unfortunately, the book goes downhill a bit in the middle section. The lives of the boys as adults did not interest me anywhere near as much as that of their childhood. In fact, I didn't like either of them very much when they meet for the first time, and fall in love with the same woman. Luckily the plot held my attention, and the ending was good enough to make up for the minor lapse of the middle section.
I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to read about African culture, without battling with symbolism or the endless horrors of war. It is a beautifully written story, and I think it has just become my favourite book with an African setting.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I have just finished Andrew Sharp's debut book and I would summarize it as "As enchanting as Alexander McCall Smith, giving deep insights into the African mind, only much more complex, challenging and satisfying". I was moved to tears by this story which was especially significant to me, evoking memories of my colonial African childhood and having recently visited a Masai kraal. True to life is the phrase.
I was especially struck by the description of the evolution of faith from the childlike understanding of the young Michael to the much more realistic and battered dawning of understanding in the adult Michael at the end. Very gritty and very real - I would go so far as to liken it to William Young's The Shack - the other great book I have read recently.
I would thoroughly recommend this book - especially to Third Culture Kids and anyone else in love with Africa. I am looking forward to a sequel.
I was especially struck by the description of the evolution of faith from the childlike understanding of the young Michael to the much more realistic and battered dawning of understanding in the adult Michael at the end. Very gritty and very real - I would go so far as to liken it to William Young's The Shack - the other great book I have read recently.
I would thoroughly recommend this book - especially to Third Culture Kids and anyone else in love with Africa. I am looking forward to a sequel.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This was one of my year's best summer reads: the kind of good thick book you can nestle into. It is a wonderfully lyrical novel set in Africa. The early sections depict two worlds that overlap in the lush landscape of colonial Uganda; the childhood of Stanley, an 8 year-old cattle-herder, and the childhood of Michael Lacey, son of missionaries.
There is a sense of each being a closed world vividly experienced - yet each is doomed by modernity pressing on its edges. The boys are both engaging heroes, similarly shy, loyal, deeply sensitive. For me the depiction of Bahima nomadic culture as the herd boys follow out the rituals of their daily lives was utterly enchanting and convincing. We see through their eyes the strangeness of Bazungu (European) behaviour as they encounter white people for the first time. We feel the jolt of that meeting and fear for them as they face exile from their own people with the prospect of boarding school.
The author, like his characters, then takes a rather brave step. We jump forward some 30 years to find Michael as an adult on a plane to Uganda for a 3 day conference. Another jolt. The adult is entirely disassociated from his past, the child's vulnerability buried in the clinical efficiency of a gifted surgeon (here Sharpe draws on his own experience as a medical practitioner.) Uganda is still raw from the trauma of Idi Amin's rule and its legacy. But the past griefs that threaten to engulf Michael take more time to surface. Inevitably, the paths of the Bahima and the Bazungu now cross.
It turns out this is very much Michael's story and I missed the chance to explore Stanley's point of view in this second half. I was too emotionally invested in the Bahima characters by then to want to see them only from the outside. But it is Michael who negotiates the minefields of cultural difference and personal loss and alienation. There are big themes here but always firmly grounded in this individual story. I'm glad the author resisted too neat a resolution but the rhythm of the novel is towards a much-needed redemption for Michael and his Bahima counterpart. Overall, this was a very satisfying read and an impressive debut for Sharp.
There is a sense of each being a closed world vividly experienced - yet each is doomed by modernity pressing on its edges. The boys are both engaging heroes, similarly shy, loyal, deeply sensitive. For me the depiction of Bahima nomadic culture as the herd boys follow out the rituals of their daily lives was utterly enchanting and convincing. We see through their eyes the strangeness of Bazungu (European) behaviour as they encounter white people for the first time. We feel the jolt of that meeting and fear for them as they face exile from their own people with the prospect of boarding school.
The author, like his characters, then takes a rather brave step. We jump forward some 30 years to find Michael as an adult on a plane to Uganda for a 3 day conference. Another jolt. The adult is entirely disassociated from his past, the child's vulnerability buried in the clinical efficiency of a gifted surgeon (here Sharpe draws on his own experience as a medical practitioner.) Uganda is still raw from the trauma of Idi Amin's rule and its legacy. But the past griefs that threaten to engulf Michael take more time to surface. Inevitably, the paths of the Bahima and the Bazungu now cross.
It turns out this is very much Michael's story and I missed the chance to explore Stanley's point of view in this second half. I was too emotionally invested in the Bahima characters by then to want to see them only from the outside. But it is Michael who negotiates the minefields of cultural difference and personal loss and alienation. There are big themes here but always firmly grounded in this individual story. I'm glad the author resisted too neat a resolution but the rhythm of the novel is towards a much-needed redemption for Michael and his Bahima counterpart. Overall, this was a very satisfying read and an impressive debut for Sharp.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A great read!
I really enjoyed this book. Took me a few pages to get hooked and then I was transported to Africa - the book evokes the richness of the landscape and the assault on the senses. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Dr Martin D Tobin
Good stuff
This was recommended to me by a famous ghost writer - and I wasnt disappointed. A refreshing read, reminding me of life in East Africa,and an absorbing story of interaction between... Read more
Published 16 months ago by jlbwye
The Ghosts of Eden
This is great first novel from Andrew Sharp.
Initially set in Uganda in the 1960's we are treated to a fascinating insight into the childhoods of three very different... Read more
Initially set in Uganda in the 1960's we are treated to a fascinating insight into the childhoods of three very different... Read more
Published on 9 Oct 2009 by Neil Morris
Great Characters
I really enjoyed this book. Some great characters and some really good contrasts - between the african bush people and western people and between religious and non-religious... Read more
Published on 20 Sep 2009 by T. Murfet
The Ghosts of Eden
My 'Best Africa Read'
In the early stages of the story, the reader is given a wonderfully intuitive journey through the looking glass into the East Africa of the 1950's... Read more
In the early stages of the story, the reader is given a wonderfully intuitive journey through the looking glass into the East Africa of the 1950's... Read more
Published on 3 July 2009 by J. B. Beazley
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
- Books > Fiction > Family Sagas
- Books > Fiction > Historical
- Books > Romance > Historical
- Books > Romance > Sagas
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
