What Is Written on the Tongue
Description
For readers of Anthony Doerr's All the Light We Cannot See and Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, a transportive historical novel about finding morality in the throes of war and colonization
Released from Nazi forced labor as World War II ends, 20-year-old Sam is quickly drafted and sent to the island of Java to help regain control of the colony. But the Indonesian independence movement is far ahead of the Dutch, and Sam is thrown into a guerilla war, his loyalties challenged when his squad commits atrocities reminiscent of those he suffered at the hands of the Nazis. Sam falls in love with both Sari and the beautiful island she calls home, but as he loses friends to sniper fire and jungle malady, he also loses sight of what he wants most -- to be a good man.
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About the Author
Anne Lazurko's first novel, Dollybird, won the WILLA Award for Historical Fiction. She has short fiction and poetry published in literary magazines and anthologies and is an active teacher, editor, and mentor in the prairie writing community. An award-winning journalist and no-awards farmer, she lives near Weyburn, Saskatchewan.
Reviews
"What is Written on the Tongue isn't an easy novel, but I highly recommend that you read it, because what it asks us to do is remember, not only the past, but also that the better angels of our own natures can transform into demons, given the right circumstances." -- Prairie Fire
"Teeming with life and drama, What Is Written on the Tongue is an ambitious, sweeping, riveting story of war, immorality, love and family. Spanning The Netherlands, Germany and Indonesia during and after the Second World War, Anne Lazurko's novel serves as a grim reminder that the oppressed sometimes become oppressors. The novel hooked me on the first page and captured me to the last." -- Lawrence Hill, author of The Book of Negroes and The Illegal
"What Is Written on the Tongue is a gripping story of frailty and resilience. Anne Lazurko's novel is a fully engaged, deeply researched study of one man's struggle to retain his humanity amid the many tragedies of war." -- Helen Humphreys, author of Field Study: Meditations on a Year at the Herbarium
"In this deft and deeply moving novel, Anne Lazurko disperses the fog of war to shine a light on one soldier's process of reckoning. As Sam confronts the enemy without and within, his creator honours the terrible vulnerability of our bodies, the essential balm of love and friendship, and the life-affirming beauty of the natural world, all the while lamenting the hell we so often make of this paradise we call home." -- Alissa York, author of The Naturalist
