The Cry of the Go-Away Bird by Andrea Eames

Elise has an idyllic childhood growing up on a Zimbabwean farm. Well cared for by her nanny and her parents, she enjoys a privileged life. But as she becomes a teenager, she becomes aware of the tensions pulling her society apart.

This eye-opening book presents recent history as observed from the point of view of the younger generation. It is an unflinching look at the culture of white Zimbabweans and the author does not shy away from presenting the beliefs and attitudes she had personally observed at such an age. Having moved from Zimbabwe to New Zealand when she was 17 years old, Eames initially tried to not look back at her past and just move on. The novel, however, developed out of a short story she wrote while an undergraduate at the University of Canterbury.

With such a tumultuous history, she had more material waiting to get out and has since completed a second novel set in Zimbabwe and is at work on a third.  ...Reviewed at the Young at Heart Book Group, Havelock North Library (YAH)

About the Author 

Andrea Eames was born in 1985. She was brought up in Zimbabwe, where she attended a Jewish school for six years, a Hindu school for one, a Catholic convent school for two and a half, and then the American International School in Harare for two years. Andrea's family moved to New Zealand in 2002. Andrea has worked as a bookseller and editor and now lives in Austin, Texas with her husband. Her first novel, The Cry of the Go-Away Bird, was published in 2011. (From the Publisher)

Author's blog: www.acatofimpossiblecolour.blogspot.co.nz 


Andrea Eames' novel The White Shadow has been longlisted for the 2012 Dylan Thomas Prize

 

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The Cry of the Go-Away Bird by Andrea Eames, 2011