"Gripping and important . . . A rare glimpse of the crumbling of the last bastion of colonialism, told by a writer of consummate skill."—Steven Harvey, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"[Natalie Gordimer] is a most worldly writer, engaged for many years in South Africa's sulfurous politics, and those politics often find their way into her fiction. Yet her stories manage to avoid the narrative death rattle of the political novelist; they live on their own, free of propaganda. The working world is never far below the surface of Gordimer's books, existing side by side—sometimes easily, sometimes not—with the sexual life, all of it within the distinctive milieu of South Africa, though that nation has many aspects of a universal human condition. She is a writer of exceptional poise, writing tight, with ruffles and flourishes kept to a minimum . . . This novel begins superbly and ends wonderfully, and in between there are passages of high intelligence, not without Gordimer's signature asperity."—Ward Just, The Washington Post Book World

"Kiser is the first American to have told the full story . . . What makes this book so unusual and yet useful for students is the way the author has combined solid research and profound analysis with compelling writing and personal engagement in the story. It is part mystery, part love story and part historical journalism of a very high order. There are precious few such books on the market. The Monks of Tibhirine brings together history, politics and stories of faith that is lived amid fear and violence in a style that is dramatic, inspiring and extremely educational. In this sense it is an excellent tool for teaching students about the Muslim world in which religion infuses life . . . This is an extraordinary story of the meeting of two peoples within the Abrahamic tradition who believed that, the violence notwithstanding, the destiny of all of them was to live together joined in charity and friendship. Kiser's book, as history and witness to faith, would be a valuable companion for many courses on religious studies, history and cultural studies of the Arab and Muslim worlds, but most of all for courses that seek to advance Christian Muslim understanding. I am going to be using it for my religion and conflict resolution course and am also recommending it as well to the Middle Eastern studies department."—Andrea Bartoli, Director, Center for International Conflict Resolution, Columbia University

"[A] marvelous picaresque . . . Mda's purpose comes through clearly: to show how many ways of dying there are in the transition to a new South Africa, whether through the brutality of white overseers and policemen or that of black gangsters . . . Reflecting the startling contrasts in such a world, tender humor and brutal violence vie with each other in Mda's pages, as do vibrant life and sudden death. The struggle between them creates an energetic and refreshing literature for a country still coming to terms with both the new and the old."—Tony Eprile, The New York Times Book Review

"Bewitching . . . [An] inspired synthesis of history, myth and satire . . . and about post-apartheid South Africa by extension . . . Luxuriantly steeped in African customs . . . [Mda is] one of his country's most trenchant current voices."—Janet Maslin, The New York Times

Winner of the Sanlam Literary Award for Best Unpublished Novel

"Beautiful [and] thoughtful."—Carolyn See, The Washington Post

An American Library Association Notable Book

"As South Africa's political imperatives have shifted, so too have those of Mda's fiction. No longer fixated on apartheid's horrors and its wished-for end, his work now examines the difficulties of transition: bourgeois decadence and the abandonment of revolutionary principles . . . the many dark shadows of political freedom. The Madonna of Excelsior [is] among the most profound and revealing portraits of life in post-apartheid South Africa. Mda succeeds in creating a South African present of compromise, bitten anger, hypocrisy, and conflicting perspective . . . Perhaps his best work."—Benjamin Austen, Harper's

"[A] powerful memoir . . . By skillfully interweaving personal history, politics, and Amhara fables . . . [Mezlekia] has produced the most riveting book about Ethiopia since Ryszard Kapuscinski's literary allegory The Emperor and the most distinguished African literary memoir since Soyinka's Ake appeared 20 years ago . . . Mezlekia has summoned, with imaginative directness and impressive tonal range, a world of uncertainty in which politics is never just background but permeates ordinary life."—Rob Nixon, The New York Times Book Review