Thank you to Robert Koehler for this book review.
Brotherless Night / V.V. Ganeshananthan
In this novel’s opening pages, Sashikala Kulenthiren, the story’s
narrator, is a sixteen year old student living in the majority-Tamil city of
Jaffa, a city in northeast Sri Lanka. She is a student preparing to take
exams that will allow her to go to medical school. The year is 1981 and
in the following chapters, Sashikala describes the beginnings of Sri Lanka’s
three decades long civil war and its effects on her family, community, and
personal life.
The civil war, sparked following anti-Tamil pogroms carried out by
the country’s majority Sinhalese population, has led to the formation of
militant groups demanding the creation of an independent Tamil state. One
of these, the Tamil Tigers, soon becomes the dominant force in and around
Jaffa, and two of Sashikala’s brothers plus a close friend decide to become
members of the group. While she is sympathetic with the rebels’ cause,
she is deeply troubled by the Tamil Tigers’ ruthless suppression of community
members who refuse to take part in the rebellion or who dare to question the
terrorist tactics they are using against the government. This leads to
the killings of a number of professors and other people she knows in the years
following.
Brotherless Night describes
Sashikala’s moral journey as she tries to navigate her way through the
unfolding conflict. A gifted storyteller, Ganeshananthan captures this
young woman’s dilemma as she is forced to decide on how much support to provide
the Tamil Tigers as a physician, and whether or not to remain silent against
their terrorist tactics and the brute force they employ to keep citizens in
line. For those wishing to know more about the Sri Lanka civil war, this
novel vividly captures its complexities and presents a heartrending portrait of
the conflict as seen through one woman’s eyes. I whole heartedly
recommend this haunting read.
A review of Ganeshananthan’s debut novel, Love Marriage, can
be found here.
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