The True Sources of the Nile

by Sarah Stone

After a year, central Africa has finally started to feel like home to Anne, a human-rights activist from California. Deeply committed to helping the strife-torn nation of Burundi during its first democratic elections, Anne has also begun an intoxicating affair with Jean-Pierre, a government official allied with the Tutsi ruling class. But when the election brings the rival Hutus to power, violence breaks out, leaving thousands of people dead, and laying bare disturbing secrets about Anne’s lover and his family. She reluctantly returns to California, only to discover troubling secrets in her own family.

As she struggles with the moral implications of all she has learned, Anne must reconcile complex conflicting claims of duty and love. The True Sources of the Nile unfolds like a passionately felt love affair that initially obscures the world around it, then comes to brilliantly illuminate it.

Genres: Fiction, Africa, Burundi, Adult

304 pages, Paperback

First published July 7, 1999

About the author

Sarah Stone (she/they) is the author of the novels The True Sources of the Nile and Hungry Ghost Theater, a finalist for the 38th Annual Northern California Book Awards. A new book, Marriage to the Sea, is forthcoming in spring 2026 from Four Way Books. Sarah is also the co-author, with Ron Nyren, of Deepening Fiction: A Practical Guide for Intermediate and Advanced Writers. Sarah’s work has appeared in Image, Ploughshares, 100 Word Story, StoryQuarterly, The Millions, Scoundrel Time, The Believer, CRAFT, Alta Journal online for the California Book Club, and A Kite in the Wind: Fiction Writers on Their Craft, and was included in the list of distinguished stories of 2020 in The Best American Short Stories 2021, Jesmyn Ward, editor. Sarah is a former LABA Fellow and a Jewish Studio Project creative facilitator and has taught for UC Berkeley, the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers, and Stanford Continuing Studies, among other places. She has also written for and taught on Korean television, reported on human rights in Burundi, looked after orphan chimpanzees at the Jane Goodall Institute, and worked as a psychiatric aide in a locked facility, a graveyard-shift waitress in the restaurant where everyone went after they’d been thrown out of all the bars in town, and an office worker in an apparently haunted massage/bodywork school in the Santa Cruz mountains.

Reviews

[DeAnn · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5⭐ I read this book for the Travel through Books global challenge; this was my book for Burundi. This book focused more on romance (and sex) than I was expecting, and while the sex scenes weren't too spicy, they were very frequent! I also thought there were maybe too many dream sequences.

However, this book taught me a LOT about Burundi, and scratched the surface of explaining the complexity of the conflict between the two major ethnic/social groups, the Tutsi and the Hutu. I cannot even begin to understand how complicated this division that is steeped in history and colonialist influence. The book does a great job of introducing the reader to Burundi culture and belief systems, as well as the difficulties of life as a human rights activist, the compassion fatigue and the hopelessness that can sometimes overwhelm them.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

Burundi.
While some of the book, the second half really takes place in the US it resonates with how an American expat brings the country with them when they return to the USA. Frankly, to me, that is an integral part of visiting so I am keeping this as a part of my "reading around the world" read-a-thon.

I am not sure why I did not chose more than three stars, it might be perhaps that while I could identify in some ways with the main character, I could not really make that connection. The character was like so many expats I have met who feel that their presence validates a country, which always rings so false with me. Having said that though, the character was a typical expat and that in and of itself deserves something more than the three stars, but that is to someone else, not me.

I learned a lot about Burundi and liked the way the relations between the Tutsis and Hutus was addressed, though I frankly know little about that situation. I think this is a good read for anyone exploring Africa in a read around the world.

[Jamie · Rating 3 out of 5]

In order to review this book, I need to share why I was reading it in 2024.

I recently uncovered, while dehoarding, pages I'd printed from a blog from the early 20th century called "chickLit." This was not your "Bridget Jones Diary" type of chicklit, rather it was an ironic title for a book of literature with a feminine/feminist stamp. The founder and writers were also affiliated with the Television Without Pity crew of writers/blogs, even writing recaps, like the one for the West Wing. I was heavily into these blogs, because the founders "took" everything about recaps from the Beverly Hills 90210 recaps, of which I was an active member of the message board scene there. I even watched the 90210 finale with one of them! So anyway, finding this list of the books they read for their book club made me want to revisit these big lady book club titles from the early part of the century.

(Chicklit from the Wayback Machine : https://web.archive.org/web/200012040...)

So now that i have given this context, I need to say that I read this book through both 2002 and 2024 eyes. 2024 eyes found the whole romance plot so so cringe. Anne is SUCH a white lady! Jean-Pierre feels less than fully realized and the amount of times he "grinned" felt like it was skirting a microagression. This book would be pilloried if it was published today. Even if it is a semi-biographical book (Stone spent time in Burundi at the same time the character did.) I am, however, sure that I would not have felt that way in 2002, rather I would have seen Anne having a simple interracial/cultural romance.
But the Mother/Daughter dynamic, especially the big reveal/surprise, and the dynamic between the sisters was a good domestic drama and I liked that part.

Also fun - as I read this in 1 day on my couch in a day with broken AC, so I spent a LOT of time languising on the couch. In the acknowledgements, Stone thanks Margot Livesey, who as her instagram shows, she is still friends with to this day, as well as Andrea Barrett and for some reason this felt dear to me. These 3 women, still literary friends for decades.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed the book: the writing, the setting in Burundi and then the US, the interesting issues it raises about how well we know people that are close to us. The major problem I had with the book was that the ending was puzzling and a bit of an anti-climax.

[Rachel Danielle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a deep, difficult book. Evident as to why it’s used/studied in several different courses in school.

[Colleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really surprised at myself when I picked this out at the library. In its essence, it's a romance and character growth novel. It takes place partly in Burundi at the outbreak of violence between the Hutus and Tutsis in the mid-1990s, and partly in San Francisco. Anne falls in love with a Tutsi upper-class prince and shares a very passionate love affair with him. When the violence erupts, she is forced to flee the country. It really strains their relationship, to the point where even his visit to San Francisco cannot mend things (and actually makes things worse). It also forces her to question yet again her beliefs, world view, life and career decisions, etc.

It's a fantastic novel - it's in no way your typical romance!

[Leilani Clark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gripping narrative that tells the tale of a white woman's struggle to come to terms with her experience in genocide-ravaged, colonialized Bujambari. I read "An Ordinary Man, this summer, Paul Rusenabagina's autobiography about the massacre of Tutsis by the Hutus in Rwanda. (a situation of course caused by the colonization of Rwanda by Germany and then Belgium--who establish a system in which the Tutsis were treated as superior to the Hutus leading to intense revenge tactics when the Belgians pulled out and left) This book, is a fictional spin on the story, by a narrator who seems a bit selfish at times, but whose struggles towards meaning in her own life rang true for me in the end.

[Marvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A remarkable novel about a human rights worker in Burundi, who falls in love with a local government official who turns out to have a troubling secret. She returns home to help her two sisters, with whom she has complicated relationships, care for their dying mother, who has a troubling secret of her own. Another wise (& sad) book (with lots of graphic sex) with no easy answers about how our passions do and should affect our relationships.

[seth · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is my second time reading this novel. the first time i read it was for a graduate school class in human rights literature and now i wanted to revisit it in light of what is going on in the world. the book offers even more to think about in terms of colonialism, classism, and race. annie is a challenging protagonist and stone writes her well. if you are familiar with international ngo work or non profits in general this book will ring true in a lot of ways, good and bad.

[Sandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay book but excruiatingly annoying and trite ending. Interesting for its depiction of modern day Burundi, but that was it, as the love affair related in the book was also trite and immature in so many ways. Why do people constantly kid themselves about relationships, choosing to ignore information that is bluntly in our faces - there for us to see if only we would be willing to LOOK at it?

[Beni]

Dark story due to the history of the country. The relationship of the lovers seems destined to work out even with their extremely different backgrounds but the harrowing experiences lead to road blocks.

I found the ending anticlimactic and disjointed but maybe it fit the leading character whom also seemed that way.

[megs_bookrack · Rating 5 out of 5]

At first I had a hard time relating to the main character as her passion seemed to overwhelm her senses which I cannot relate to. Initially I found her weak and naive. Her character grows so much and I found myself eventually relating to her and in fact commiserating with her. I read this book because it was about Burundi but it is really about so much more. A snapshot of humanity.

[Fay · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVE IT - a great and thoughtful love story about an expat American living in Africa....how the african sensibilites may not seem to be as sweepingly different at first glance, but where we are from is an integral part of who we are.

[Virginia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vivid, even disturbing portrayal of harsh realities faced by an idealistic, passionate young woman attempting to meld the wildly contrasting cultures/histories/families of her and her Burundian lover. A little too tidy in the end, but lush and messy enough throughout to make up for that.

[Pam]

11/24 rec via bookmooch

[lixy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well written novel set in Africa