A Constellation of Vital Phenomena (ALA Notable Books for Adults) - Hardcover

Marra, Anthony

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0770436404 ISBN 13: 9780770436407

Publisher: Hogarth Pr, 2013

Synopsis

A National Book Awards Longlist Selection

A New York Times and Washington Post bestseller

A story of the transcendent power of love in wartime, A Constellation of Vital Phenomena is a work of sweeping breadth, profound compassion, and lasting significance.

Two doctors risk everything to save the life of a hunted child in this majestic debut about love, loss, and the unexpected ties that bind us together. “On the morning after the Feds burned down her house and took her father, Havaa woke from dreams of sea anemones.” Havaa, eight years old, hides in the woods and watches the blaze until her neighbor, Akhmed, discovers her sitting in the snow. Akhmed knows getting involved means risking his life, and there is no safe place to hide a child in a village where informers will do anything for a loaf of bread, but for reasons of his own, he sneaks her through the forest to the one place he thinks she might be safe: an abandoned hospital where the sole remaining doctor, Sonja Rabina, treats the wounded. Though Sonja protests that her hospital is not an orphanage, Akhmed convinces her to keep Havaa for a trial, and over the course of five extraordinary days, Sonja’s world will shift on its axis and reveal the intricate pattern of connections that weaves together the pasts of these three unlikely companions and unexpectedly decides their fate.

About this title

Review:

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
#1 Indie Next List Pick
A Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Pick
An O, The Oprah Magazine Debut Novel to Pick Up Now
"Anthony Marra's fine debut novel reaches tenderly, unflinchingly into the centre of Chechen conflict of the late 1990s. This tale has its roots in shocking brutality, and its beauty in the human redemption that can come from unaccountable human kindness. Whimsies of circumstance, fate, and the ties of family and faith serve to guide the reader and the characters through a richly layered and deeply beautiful journey."
--Vincent Lam, author of "The Headmaster's Wager
"
"Powerful, convincing, beautifully realized--it's hard to believe that "A Constellation of Vital Phenomena" is a first novel. Anthony Marra is a writer to watch and savor."
--T.C. Boyle, "New York Times" bestselling author of "When the Killing's Done" and "The Women
"
"The book encompasses torture, infidelity, heartbreak and human trafficking, but also love, friendship, family and humour. Marra doesn't gloss over the horrors of the Chechen wars. But he doesn't dwell either, and despite the subject matter, this is not an exclusively dark book. In his afterword, Marra acknowledges a debt to Michael Ondaatje. Like Ondaatje's "Anil's Ghost," "Vital Phenomena "is about the gaps left behind by the forcibly disappeared. It's a difficult subject for fiction, but one Marra manages with a voice that approaches something like the gauzy beauty of Ondaatje's prose."
--"Maclean's
"
"The simplest life cannot precisely be put down in details or marks on a page--the spirit fundamentally escapes language, if only because we can't pronounce the words. Nonetheless, "A Constellation of Vital Phenomena" proves that if anything, it's better, more beautiful and necessary to keep trying."
--Emily M. Keeler, "The Globe and Mail"
"Some good novels catch fire immediately, as if a writer had simply opened a Zippo lighter..

Book Description:

When everything else seems lost, watch out for the unexpected ties that bind us together...

About this edition

• Publisher: Hogarth Pr
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0770436404
• ISBN 13: 9780770436407
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 384