Sweetness in the Belly: A Novel - Hardcover

Gibb, Camilla

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 159420084X ISBN 13: 9781594200847

Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The, 2006

Synopsis

Orphaned at the age of eight, British-born Lilly studiously devotes her life to the teachings of the Qur'an from within a Moroccan Sufi shrine but is persecuted for her foreign heritage, a situation that remains challenging when she subsequently flees to London and finds herself equally disconnected. By the author of Mouthing the Words. 30,000 first printing.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

From award-winning and bestselling author Camilla Gibb comes a richly imagined narrative of one woman's search for love and belonging cast against a nuanced portrait of political upheaval.
In the racially charged world of Thatcher's London, Lilly, a young, white, Muslim nurse, struggles in a state of invisible exile. As Ethiopian refugees gradually begin to fill the flats of the housing estate where she lives, she begins to share her longing for a home in that distant land and her heartbreaking search for her missing lover, Aziz.
Gibb takes us on a journey back to Haile Selassie's Ethiopia, and tells the remarkable story of Lilly's discovery of an unexpected place for herself within the walls of the ancient city of Harar, a revered centre of Islam, unique in its language, customs and beliefs. As her roots in the place deepen so too does her clandestine relationship with the young Dr. Aziz. But Ethiopia is veering toward revolution, and hope for a future with Aziz is dramatically threatened when the country is thrown into political turmoil.
A psychologically complex and utterly convincing story, alive with political insight and sensuous detail, Sweetness in the Belly is a mesmerizing work from one of Canada's most distinctive and exciting voices.

"From the Hardcover edition.

About the Author

Camilla Gibb was born in London, England, and grew up in Toronto. She has a Ph.D. in social anthropology from Oxford University for which she conducted fieldwork in Ethiopia. Her two previous novels, Mouthing the Words, winner of the City of Toronto Book Award in 2000, and The Petty Details of So-and-So's Life, have been published in eighteen countries and translated into fourteen languages, receiving rave reviews all around the world. She is one of twenty-one writers on the Orange Futures List--a list of young writers to watch, compiled by the jury of the prestigious Orange Prize. Camilla lives in Toronto, where she serves as vice president of PEN Canada and is currently writerin-residence at the University of Toronto.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 159420084X
• ISBN 13: 9781594200847
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352