Island of a Thousand Mirrors
ABOUT
THE BOOK
In Island of a Thousand Mirrors, Nayomi Munaweera writes with ferocity, fire and poetry of the incomprehensible madness of civil war and its effects upon those caught within it, whether in the villages and cities of Sri Lanka, or half a world away. A masterful, incendiary debut – Janet Fitch author of White Oleander.
A few months after the 1983 riots, a Sinhalese family leaves Sri Lanka for America. The two children, Yasodhara and Lanka adapt to their new life quickly, but memories of their childhood on a tropical island in the middle of the Indian Ocean is seared into their soul. Meanwhile, Saraswathi lives in the middle of the war-torn country struggling to be a teenager in a land that is anything but normal.
This is a beguiling tale of three women swept up in the turbulence of an island’s history and whose fate is woven intricately together in war, migration, love, exile and belonging. Covering three quarters of a century of Sri Lanka’s past, this beautifully written novel combines harsh reality, love and tenderness with astonishing insight.
NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS
Long-listed for the Man Asia Award and short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, Island of a Thousand Mirrors relates the story of two families and their experiences during the many decades of the brutal Sri Lankan Civil War, as told by the eldest daughter of each family.