The Stone Virgins

Yvonne Vera

 

Synopsis

The Stone Virgins tells a story of wounding and trauma. But whereas her earlier work plumbs the traumatized psyches of individual characters, this one ambitiously reaches outward and across time. She interweaves the lives of two sisters with the story of their community, Kezi, a rural town located 200 kilometers west of the city of Bulawayo. With this expansive sweep-across the geography of Matebeleland province, over a period of 36 years-the story of an entire nation unfolds.

Review

... those content with an abstract story of the universal human condition will be moved by Vera's powerful but shadowy picture of brutality and innocence, peace and savagery in a tragic land that is called Zimbabwe. All her readers will admire Vera's courage in revealing these truths, however abstractly, in a country that has not yet faced them, and where the government continues to victimise the innocent. - The International Journal of African Historical Studies

Author

Yvonne Vera was an award-winning author from Zimbabwe. Her novels are known for their poetic prose, difficult subject-matter, and their strong women characters, and are firmly rooted in Zimbabwe's difficult past.