FICTION

The Strength of Bone

by Lucie Wilk
Biblioasis. Oct. 2013. 352p. ISBN 9781927428399. pap. $16.95. F
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Dr. Henry Bryce travels from Toronto to a hospital in Blantyre, Malawi. Sister Iris Mwachilale comes to the same hospital from a remote village in the surrounding countryside. The city leaves Iris feeling rootless, torn between her book learning and the spiritual traditions and community of her village, while Henry is overwhelmed by the primitive conditions of the tuberculosis-, malaria-, and AIDS-infested hospital. Debut author Wilk (herself a medical doctor) alternates between these narrators, two very different people who share dissatisfaction with the hospital and a desire to escape their past troubles. They'll begin to find themselves as the story culminates in a fateful trip back to Iris's village near the base of the beautiful but ominous mountain called Sapitwa.
VERDICT Wilk illuminates the differences between Malawian culture and that of the West while capturing both the fever-dream beauty and desperation of the country. If her novel has any weakness, it's a lack of plot and character development. Readers who enjoyed Abraham Verghese's Cutting for Stone may want to give this book a try.
Reviewed by Neil Hollands, Williamsburg Regional Lib., VA , Oct 01, 2013
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