'A fine novel, deeply evocative of the devastated cities of the Angolan interior, choking with the displaced and the dying in the final days of that country's brutal civil war. It quite took me back, so much so that I found myself having arguments with characters over some of their security and operational choices, such is the power of the book and its descriptions of those bleak times. But even so, Kyazze reminds us of a fundamental truth: that love endures and there can be hope for a modicum of justice amidst all the expanse of inhumanity and corruption that she so meticulously depicts' Aidan McQuade, author of An Undiscovered Country'A.B. Kyazze brings to the story a photographer’s eye, capturing the tragedy and beauty of the people caught up in Angola’s civil war' Joss Stirling, author of The Silence'An atmospheric jigsaw puzzle of a novel that fits together, stage by stage, from a series of vivid episodes. The story of Lena’s search for her missing sister sweeps the reader across expanses of space and time: from wintry 1980s London, to the Lisbon of Lena's mother's youth, to the heat of war-ravaged, early twenty-first century Angola and beyond. A memorable debut' Emily Midorikawa, author of A Secret Sisterhood: The Hidden Friendships of Austen, Brontё, Eliot and Wool‘Totally gripped ... I come away moved, desperately sad, and somehow also hopeful – because, with this story, A. B. Kyazze holds up both the dark and the light of humanity – how, even in desperate, terrible circumstances, there are those touches of love, of kindness’ Julia Crouch, author of Her Husband’s Lover‘A story of love and the power of family, set in the dying days of Angola's brutal twenty-six-year civil war… The finale is as thrilling as it is unexpected’ Oscar Scafidi, author of Kayak the Kwanza
