Ancestor Stones

by Aminatta Forna

A powerful, sensuously written novel that, through the lives of women, beautifully captures Africa’s past and present, and the legacy that her daughters take with them wherever they live.

From the author of The Devil That Danced on the Water - a timeless portrait of the lives of a family of independent, spirited African women over the last century of dramatic cultural change

Aminatta Forna’s The Devil That Danced on the Water was rapturously acclaimed, a moving and gorgeously written memoir that garnered inter­national attention. Now she has seamlessly turned her hand to fiction and delivers a novel that is lush and beautiful, a touching and intimate portrait of several generations of African women.

In Ancestor Stones, a young woman from West Africa, who has lived in England for many years and is married to a British man, returns to visit her family after years of civil war. Her four aunts have decided to leave her the family coffee plantation, as she is the last person in the family with the means to revive its fortunes. And on this trip home she is given an unprecedented look into the lives of the women in her family as her aunts Mary, Hawa, Asana, and Serah— women who were mysterious and a bit intimidating to her younger self—begin to tell her their stories. They are timeless tales of rivalrous co-wives, patriarchal society, and old religions challenged by Islamic and Christian incursions; they are modern stories of European-owned mining companies, the repressive influence of mission schools, corrupt elections, and the postcolonial African elite. Through their voices a family history interwoven with the history of a country emerges—one of a society both ancient and modern, of a family of strong women refusing to live as second-class citizens.

In her debut foray into fiction, Forna has created a powerful, sensuously written novel that, through the lives of women, beautifully captures Africa’s past and present, and the legacy that her daughters take with them wherever they live. It is a wonderful achievement that recalls The God of Small Things and The Joy Luck Club, and establishes Forna as a gifted novelist.

Genres: Africa, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Sierra Leone, Novels, African Literature, Literary Fiction

336 pages, Hardcover

First published August 14, 2006

About the author

Aminatta’s books have been translated into eighteen languages. Her essays have appeared in Freeman’s, Granta, The Guardian, LitHub, The Nation, The New York Review of Books, The Observer and Vogue. She has written stories for BBC radio and written and presented television documentaries including “The Lost Libraries of Timbuktu” (BBC Television, 2009) and “Girl Rising” (CNN, 2013).

Aminatta is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a member of the Folio Academy. She has acted as judge for the Samuel Johnson Prize, the Bailey Prize for Women’s Fiction, the Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award, the Caine Prize and the International Man Booker Prize.

In 2003 Aminatta established the Rogbonko Project to build a school in a village in Sierra Leone. The charity has also run a number of projects in the spheres of adult education, sanitation and maternal health.

Aminatta is the recipient of a Windham Campbell Award from Yale University, has won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize Best Book Award 2011, a Hurston Wright Legacy Award the Liberaturpreis in Germany and the Aidoo-Snyder Book Prize. She has been a finalist for the Neustadt Prize for Literature, the Orange Prize for Fiction, the IMPAC Award and the Warwick Prize. Aminatta Forna was made OBE in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours 2017.

She is currently Lannan Visiting Chair of Poetics at Georgetown University and Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.

Reviews

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Abie returns home from England to West Africa to visit her family after years of civil war, and to reclaim the family plantation, Kholifa Estates, formerly owned by her grandfather. There to meet her are her aunts: Asana, Mariama, Hawa, and Serah, and so begins her gathering of the family and the country’s history through the tales of her aunts.

If you read the description above, you will understand how this is a "fixup" novel - a grouping of stories from the point of various aunts. They fit together nicely and present different time periods and different perspectives of one family in Sierra Leone, but always from the female perspective in a society where women are traded as commodities. It showed strength and community and I really enjoyed it.

[Chrissie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Abie must decide if she should accept the inheritance of her family’s West African coffee plantation. Although not stated, it is in Sierra Leonne. She has been chosen by her family because they believe her to be the one best able to resurrect it, reinvent it, make something new of it. For years Abie has lived in England. Now, in July 2003, she travels back to her homeland to make her decision. On her return, four aunts—Asana, Mariama, Hawa and Serah--tell her their life stories. Will their stories pull her back? The women’s stories are meant to represent the lives of African women over the entire 20th century, not only the women of Sierra Leone. It is for this reason Serra Leone is not stated outright.

The eldest aunt is born in 1926, and we learn of her grandparents too. We follow events into the 21st century. The four aunts are half-sisters, daughters of the same father. Their mothers are different, each a different wife of their father, a wealthy plantation owner. Their father, who is Abie’s grandfather, had eleven wives and some three dozen children!

The women tell their stories to Abie. It is these first person accounts that make up this book. The stories are collected into four sections entitled Seeds, Dreams, Secrets and Consequences . The stories overlap. The aunts speak not only of their own lives but also of each other, of their husbands, children and the events that bind them. Ancestral traditions, life under colonial rule and before, during and after the civil war are viewed through these women’s tales.

There’s the background. Here’s what I have to add. I adore the women’s stories. The prose is so genuine. It feels as though the women are really talking to you and me, although it is Abie they are actually talking to. I give the book four stars due to the prose, due to the words by which the women’s stories are told. What we are told is colorful and heartfelt, full of details, and all are told in a natural manner. What we are seeing is history, events, places and people through the eyes of women. Lines are sometimes lyrical, other times perceptive and wise. We are not reading a straight recital of historical facts; we are reading how events in history damage, destroy and also strengthen human beings. This is how I like history told!

But, and this is a BIG big but, reading this is confusing and terribly exasperating at times. One hops back and forth between different times and places and people. Sometimes it is difficult to determine who is talking, let alone who is being spoken of! The paper book has a family tree. To fully appreciate the stories, you need that tree! You can manage without it, but it is much better with it. The audio version has no PDF file and thus has no family tree. Nor can you see the chapter titles or how the chapters, i.e. the stories, have been grouped. This is very annoying. With every chapter change, I became annoyed. As I sunk into the chapter and the story told there, I became captivated once again. My mood went up and down like a yoyo!

So maybe you think it might be better to read the paper book instead? That is not the solution I recommend. The audio narration by Adjoa Andoh is marvelous. Her intonations for the aunts cannot be improved upon--they are so intimate, so personal. like someone is really sitting there across from you, speaking to you. She also does accents extremely well. The narration I have given five stars!

What I suggest you do is get a copy of the family tree from the library. Have it there in front of you, and then listen to the audiobook. Listen very carefully to the titles of each chapter and always write them down. If you do this, you will be aware of when you switch from one group of stories to the next. Listen carefully for the four headings-- Seeds, Dreams, Secrets and Consequences . These groupings give a shape, an overall form and organization to the book that is otherwise easily lost.

I love the prose of this book. Even if I was at times mightily annoyed, I must give it four stars.

A few quotes will I hope give you a feel for the prose:

“In his head, I saw him one day counting me as one of his possessions.”

“We know ourselves by the reactions of other people.”

“The salt glittered on my skin like powdered diamonds.”

“The air was heavy like glue.”

“Once we were no longer afraid, there was nothing they could do.”


*************************

There are numerous autobiographical and biographical elements in the stories of Ancestor Stones. This book follows on the heels of the author’s earlier non-fictional The Devil That Danced on the Water: A Daughter's Quest. From their respective ratings you see which I prefer.

*The Devil That Danced on the Water: A Daughter's Quest 2 stars
*Ancestor Stones 4 stars

[Katya]

Por vezes, pensamos que estamos encurralados. Ou seguimos num sentido da estrada ou no outro. Uma estrada para a esquerda. Uma estrada para a direita. Temos de escolher e não importa qual. Nenhuma delas é aquela que queremos. No entanto, por vezes, se olharmos com muita atenção, conseguimos ver o caminho sinuoso que avança por entre as árvores. É difícil de ver, mas apenas porque ainda ninguém enveredou por ele.

O registo tradicional próximo da oralidade com que nos chegam os testemunhos que compõem Jardim de Mulheres foi o aspecto mais marcante que encontrei neste livro, pois por mais que Aminatta se esforce, a narrativa a quatro vozes que pretende criar (cinco se contarmos com a intromissão da narradora) é monocórdica, e as mulheres que deviam ser as heroínas da história mesclam-se demasiado, quebradas, é certo por uma sociedade patriarcal e chauvinista cujo objetivo primeiro é exatamente o de apagar a individualidade feminina - mas, precisamente por isso, nesta narrativa o apagamento não se devia fazer sentir de forma tão efetiva, de contrário, perde a sua força e isso sente-se de forma muito negativa.
Ainda assim, e apesar de logo de início suspeitar onde me levaria esta inabilidade por parte da autora, insisti em terminar a leitura e fi-lo por uma razão muito simples: pela oportunidade de ouvir contar estas histórias na primeira pessoa (segunda, realmente), histórias de uma cultura castradora, a que estas mulheres resistiram por meio de artifícios femininos por excelência: a memória, a palavra, a narração...

(...)aqui o passado sobrevive no aroma de um grão de café, a história de uma pessoa captada pelo ouvido, e essas preciosíssimas lembranças estão escondida no lugar mais seguro de todos. Protegidas do fogo, das inundações ou da guerra. Em histórias. Histórias recordadas até estarem prontas para serem contadas ou talvez simplesmente prontas para serem ouvidas.
É uma tarefa que cabe às mulheres, guardar assim as histórias, tal como cuidar do jardim.

Lembrando a atmosfera de O Deus das Pequenas Coisas - embora lhe escape toda a perícia de que Arundhati Roy artilha a sua narrativa -, Jardim de Mulheres é - ou tenta ser - um relato de quem procura escapar das malhas de uma sociedade estratificada e desigual onde a vontade masculina é exaltada pela exploração física, psicológica e sexual das mulheres que se vêm obrigadas, entre outras indignidades, a casamentos forçados...

Depois de eu ter casado, aprendi muito. Não aprendi tanto sobre os homens, afinal, Osman Iscandari não era todos os homens. Aprendi mais sobre mim. Sobre nós. Sobre as mulheres - como nos transformam nas mulheres em que nos tornamos, como nos moldamos a nós mesmas, como nos moldamos umas às outras.

... à poligamia...

Sabes o que significa, na nossa língua, a palavra «ores»? Ores. Significa co-esposa. As mulheres que partilham o nosso marido connosco. As mulheres com as quais nos revezamos para cozinhar. As mulheres a quem damos o que sobra na nossa panela. As mulheres que são as outras mães dos nossos filhos, que amamentam o nosso bebé quando o leite seca ou azeda inesperadamente.

...e à mutilação genital como formas de controlo, repressão e rebaixamento:

Talvez seja algo que não queres ouvir. Tens pena de nós, não é? Julgas que não temos os mesmos sentimentos que tu por causa do que nos foi tirado, que estamos mortas nas partes baixas. Que não temos desejo. Que nos unimos a um homem sem ter prazer. Percebes o quanto é difícil para mim falar nestes assuntos: estamos votadas ao silêncio. Assim, suportamos o teu desprezo. Mas há coisas que devem ser ditas. Para que tu, pelo menos, compreendas. Pois és nossa filha. Escuta.
(...)Nessa primeira noite: sentada no frio ribeiro com as outras raparigas, a mascar ervas amargas e à espera do momento em que chamassem o meu nome. O círculo de buracos na terra a encherem-se de sangue. Um a um. Aquilo que recordamos depois não é a dor. Isso é esquecido, como a dor do parto. Não, aquilo de que mais me lembro é do som de uma lâmina a cortar a minha própria carne. Um som tão vulgar como uma cozinheira a cortar a dobra da asa de uma galinha.
A minha mãe tinha-me dito: «Quando terminar, levantas-te e andas». Prometi a mim mesma que o faria. Coloquei um pano entre as coxas com força. As minhas pernas tremiam. Respirava de modo ofegante. A dor surgia em vagas, rebentando contra mim. Concentrei-me apenas numa coisa - em afastar-me daquele lugar. Um passo de cada vez. Um pé à frente do outro.
Tornamo-nos mulheres duas vezes. Pela primeira vez, quando somos iniciadas. Pela segunda, quando vamos ao quarto do nosso marido.

Pela denúncia que faz destes elementos, por nos lembrar que, por vezes, em determinado espaço e tempo, uma mulher não custa mais do que uma saca de arroz (literalmente), que a sua voz não é ouvida, nem a sua vontade cumprida ou sequer admitida, Jardim de Mulheres é - ou poderia ser - uma narrativa urgente:

Recordo-me de estar à espera, em frente duma mesa de madeira, enquanto a enfermeira procurava o meu processo nas gavetas.
- Ah, sim - exclamou ela, passado pouco tempo, retirando um envelope de papel pardo de entre muitos outros. Inclinou a cabeça para ler o que constava no seu interior. - Laqueação das trompas. - Eu nem sequer sabia o que tais palavras significavam. - As suas trompas foram laqueadas. Logo, não terá mais filhos. Diz aqui que já tem seis. - Apontou para o que ali estava escrito no papel. Seis! A forma como ela o disse parecia uma acusação. Enquanto eu ouvia música de flauta em sonhos, enquanto eles retiravam o bebé morto. Era aquilo que me tinham feito.(...)
Nem sequer fiz questão de que ela chamasse o médico. Não fiz quaisquer perguntas. Assenti com a cabeça como se já o soubesse, aceitando as suas palavras. Virei as costas e fui para casa. Quem era eu para discutir? Na minha cabeça, pensava que o médico, cujas habilitações estavam penduradas na parede atrás de um vidro reluzente, devia saber mais do que eu.

Aquilo que aqui falha é, efetivamente, a capacidade de criar quatro individualidades, quatro mulheres, quatro vozes que nos tragam estas histórias (conforme a autora pretende). Misturadas como acabam por ficar - destinguindo-se só de nome - tornam as três centenas de páginas de Jardim de Mulheres um longo rosário de desgraça e injustiças cometidas contra as mulheres africanas, não lhes chegando a dar o poder e o controlo que almejam e merecem pelas suas histórias particulares. Obliterar assim as personalidades individuais, apesar de a sua história ser universal, resulta pouco eficaz e o impacto de que fiquei à espera, e que não chegou, penou certamente por causa disso. É por isso que, apesar de apelar a valores nobres, denunciar crimes medonhos e contar histórias que ainda hoje se silenciam, Jardim de Mulheres não passa de uma tentativa, muito bem intencionada, de criar uma obra literária com maiúscula. No entanto, a realidade é que não passa de um esqueleto de uma obra a que Aminatta precisava de insuflar verdadeiro vigor.

Pois a vida não é uma linha recta, tal como a Terra não é plana. Não caminhamos e caminhamos até chegarmos a um lugar onde sabemos ser o fim. Como os europeus, outrora, acreditaram. Pensavam que, se navegassem em direcção ao horizonte, cairiam da extremidade, numa cascata. Então, apareceu Galileu e, depois disso, encontraram-nos aqui, colocados na curva da Terra. Por vezes, interrogo-me porque demoraram tanto. Nós sabiamos que a Terra era redonda muito antes disso.
Não, a vida não é uma linha recta. É um círculo, cuja curva lenta e suave não conseguimos detectar até nos apercebermos de que voltámos ao ponto de partida.


Não deixa de ser interessante, já agora, dar uma vista de olhos ao The Rogbonko Village Project - uma iniciativa lançada por Aminatta, na vila que o seu avô fundou, em Serra Leoa, a qual está comprometida com a educação, o saneamento e a saúde das mulheres:
https://aminattaforna.com/rogbonko.html

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

“[A] certain giddiness had come over my aunts as if the time spent remembering the girls and women they once had been had invigorated the spirits. They'd lifted the past from their own shoulders and handed it to me. I didn't see it as a burden, not at all. Rather a treasure trove of memories, of lives lived and lessons learned, of terrors faced and pleasures tasted.” – Aminatta Forna, Ancestor Stones

Set in Sierra Leone, this book tells the stories of four women, half-sisters, as they relate significant events in their lives to their niece, Abie. The four women share the same father, who eventually had eleven wives. It takes place over the majority of the 20th century (1926-1999), as the country evolves through colonialism, civil war, and sovereignty. Abie travels from her current home in England to west Africa to her family’s coffee plantation, where she traces the family history through the lives of these four aunts.

The narrative is rich in details of the Sierra Leone’s culture and natural environment. It is a patchwork of various stories that provide an overall impression of the history and changes over time within the country from the female perspective. It occasionally feels fragmented due to the many shifts in perspectives and time periods. This is my second novel by Aminatta Forna and I am turning into an enthusiastic fan. Her writing style is richly textured with details while not losing sight of the larger picture.

[leynes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Set in a fictional West African location most resembling Sierra Leone, Aminatta Forna's Ancestor Stones is made up of multi-layered stories narrated through the voices of four women in the Kholifa family: cousins Asana, Mary, Hawa and Serah , whose different mothers are all married to the patriarch Gibril, a rich man who, by the time he dies aged 100, has acquired 11 wives.

Asana, the oldest, is the daughter of Gibril's first wife Namina, a revered position because she assumes authority over subsequent wives. Her story begins in 1926 with her father's journey into the forest to found a new village, Rofathane, and start a coffee plantation. When she is 10 her favoured twin brother Alusani dies, and Asana hopes to win her mother's affections, but Namina, believing her daughter is possessed by the dead twin, becomes obsessed with exorcising his spirit instead.

Next, in 1931, we hear from Mary, whose mother Sakie is Gibril's third wife. Sakie has two preoccupations, selling snuff and following the traditional spiritual practice of reading and talking to stones. But when a Muslim preacher comes to the district, imposing a strict moral code, Sakie's fearful husband forces her to relinquish both. Sakie falls into depression, leaves the village and eventually goes insane. Her daughter, until this point named Mariama, is sent to a convent where she is baptised courtesy of funds raised by a school in Idaho as part of their Pagan Baby Project. They also send her a good Catholic name, Mary.

Hawa's story begins in 1939. She is the daughter of the lowly-ranked sixth wife, Tenkamu, who is, to the other wives' chagrin, her husband's favourite. Scorned and envied by the women, when Tenkamu falls sick she is blamed for any misfortune that befalls the village. When she dies, Hawa exacts revenge on her mother's accusers.

The youngest cousin is Serah, speaking in 1950; her mother Saffie is ranked at number 10 and therefore has no status at all. Saffie is falsely accused of adultery, which leads to her departure from the village. Serah marries and studies in Britain, where she gains independence, but when they return home she faces the dilemma of an unfaithful husband too easily readjusting to the social mores of a polygamous culture.

Loss is a thread running through the novel, especially the loss of mothers; so too is the spirit world, which hovers around the material one. All the women are subject to the hierarchies of the polygamous family structure, which works for or against them, while malicious gossip and small-community pressure to conform is shown to destroy lives. Even so, Asana looks back in 1998 on life in Rofathane with nostalgia: "There existed an order, an order in which everybody had their place. An imperfect order. An order we understood."

The women's triumphs and tragedies are played out within a society in transition over the better part of a century: colonialism, independence and the horrors of civil war are so subtly and deftly woven into the stories that it takes a while to realise that major national shifts have taken place. While the four narrators are vehicles for inspired storytelling and beautifully crafted prose, it's a shame that their voices are not more distinctive, as eventually they blend into each other and it's easy to get lost. And they are sometimes too respectfully portrayed, lacking the foibles and humour that would create more empathy.

Aminatta Forna made her debut with a highly praised memoir, The Devil that Danced on the Water. This is her first novel, but it is too slick and polished to read like one. The women who form the center of this almost century-long family saga never truly come to life. Forna's writing style veers towards kitsch too often, and she continuously makes the rookie mistakes of telling and explaining every little thing instead of just showing them and letting her readers come to their own conclusions. Forna constantly tells you how to feel about her characters and the events they live through, it's a shame as her debut novel had much potential. Forna explores how the past can be a burden as well as a gift:

In the meantime a certain giddiness had come over my aunts as if the time spent remembering the girls and women they once had been had invigorated the spirits. They'd lifted the past from their own shoulders and handed it to me. I didn't see it as a burden at all. Rather a treasure trove of memories, of lives lived and lessons learned, of terrors faced and pleasures tasted.

But I still wish she had focused on the young Abie and the present more than on her aunts and their lives. Abie's character had the most potential to me, yet we only briefly catch a glimpse of her in the prologue and epilogue. A missed opportunity, in my humble opinion.

[Jalilah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Through the multiple points of view of 4 daughters, all from different wives, of a once powerful plantation owner, Ancestor Stones tells the stories of a large extended family and at the same time of Sierra Leone. It is very powerful and richly detailed. By having the very different "aunties" share their life experiences with their niece Abby, the author was able depict 4 very different women and how they dealt with life's hardships, marriage and just surviving in the world. Some of the stories were more engaging than others and sometimes to me they felt too fragmented from each other. However all in all, this was a book that truly drew me into another world and left me still in its atmosphere after reading it.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I discovered Aminatta Forna when I read her memoir of her childhood in Sierra Leone as the daughter of a Temne doctor and a Scottish mother as well as the search for what happened to her father, who went into politics but refused to be corrupted and who subsequently disappeared. After the civil war which nearly destroyed the country, Forna went back to Sierra Leone to visit her family and research her father’s fate. It was getting to know the women in her father’s family that inspired her to write this book, which, though not set specifically in Sierra Leone, clearly chronicles the experiences of four aunts (sisters with different mothers) of Abie, an African woman who lives in London married to a white man but returning to her native country to revitalize the family farming business. The body of the book consists of 16 sections, four each in the voices of the four sisters as they tell their stories to Abie. The earliest story is dated 1926 and the latest 1999. The earlier stories chronicle life in a tribal village that’s relatively untouched by the contemporary world; the later ones chronicle terrifying experiences during the civil war.

The novel does have some problems, primarily with the structure that holds it together. It’s difficult keeping the sisters straight. There’s a family tree printed at the beginning of the book and I found myself referring to it often to see how the various characters were related. I also found myself flipping back again and again to remind myself of the past of the sister I was reading. It was also sometimes difficult to recognize that each of the sisters is talking to Abie. I’d run into a “you” and wonder who she was talking to until I remembered the frame of the novel. That said, by the second set of stories, I found myself hooked on the characters, anxious to know what would happen to them, looking forward to seeing how they would survive the war years. Nothing I have ever read has brought me closer to understanding the lives of African women. When Serah chronicles her loneliness and isolation at a teacher's training college in London, I feel her frustration, not only with the cold and dark but with the lack of color and of human interaction: no one looks at her as she walks through a bigger city than she's ever known, with more people than she has ever seen before at one time, all avoiding eye contact.

The experience of these women is rich and full, and the process of reading their stories is the process of living an African life and coming to problems of the modern world from a cultural experience totally unlike that of women raised in the US. It gave me more insights into African life than two years living in Sierra Leone as a Peace Corps volunteer. Incidentally it clarified for me why African-Americans were even more “at sea” than I was in that culture. I at least did not expect to “belong”. The main character, Abie, and her counterpart, the author, Aminatta Forna, had to pay cultural dues in order to belong. We see it in how the sisters view Abie, in how their attitudes toward her change, and in how she herself in the end gives up indoor showers in favor of bathing in the river. A bit of an awkward symbol but significant nonetheless.

[Gisela Hafezparast · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really excellent about three generations of ordinary women from Sierra Leone all of whom were either the wives, daughters or granddaughters of a rich man. Whilst it was an excellent depiction of what plural marriage (the man had 11 wives) does to women and their children, it is also an excellently drawn story of women's life in Sierra Leone from colonisation to independence and civil war. But most of all it shows how strong these women were and how close-knit their multi-families had to be to survive and they depended on each other, despite and often because of the men in their lives. Whilst most of these women have very little conventional education, and those who do did not to benefit from this education much because of the male-dominated societies they lived in, the stories tell of much inherited wisdom transmitted from one women to another.

[Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully written. I only wished that each woman's voice was more distinct from the others. I think that the only Aminatta Forna book I have left to read is The Devil That Danced on the Water: A Daughter's Quest.

[Ana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gostei muito deste livro, as 4 estrelas são, na verdade, mais 4,5, faltou só um bocadinho para chegar ao 5. Está muito bem escrito e transporta-nos para África, através das memórias de várias mulheres, cujas vidas se cruzam entre si. Os contrastes entre europeus e africanos, contados do ponto de vista destas mulheres, são também muito interessantes, assim como a visão de África através dos olhos de uma mulher que saiu de lá muito jovem e estudou e casou na Europa.

[Ana Ovejero · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of women in Sierre Leone from the colonisation time until the civil war narrated by four women who are the daughters of different wives of a tribe chief.
The language is wonderful and the scenes are unique, each voice able to develop their perspective of a story entangle in the history of their country.
Highly recommended!!!

[Kavita · Rating 2 out of 5]

The narrator is Abie, who returns from England to her native African country to deal with her inheritance. Once there, she meets four of her aunts: Asana, Mariama, Hawa, and Serah. They each want her to succeed at a coffee plantation in her inherited land and then tell her their individual stories, painting a picture of the culture and taking the historical context in account.

The concept is good and has been executed well by several authors, but the actual writing and plot and character development is terrible! The four women blended into each other because the author had given them the same voice. This destroyed the novel and prevented it from having any kind of perspicacity that could be of value to the reader. I kept going back and forth, trying to figure out how to connect the four women's stories, their relationship to each other and to Abie, and failed miserably. And then, as happens, at some point, I lost interest.

The story is VERY OBVIOUSLY set in Sierra Leone, as any person with even a minor interest in history would be able to figure out. But the author, for some reason, chose to act like this is a huge secret and failed to mention the specific culture and country anywhere. Connecting it to Sierra Leonean culture and history might have helped the author (and me) to add further context to the story, especially in the last portion of the book discussing the civil war. Personally, I feel that if Forna has chosen to add more local context to the story, it would be enriched by it. Instead, let's all pretend it's a secret country with black people, civil war, military takeovers, and colonisation.

I am not sure what Abie's role in the story was or why she even existed as a character. Is this a nod to the author's own identity of being British and Sierra Leonian? Does every author need to insert themselves into a story and create a random character of no use in their likeness? Thankfully, the book is not dragged into deeper abyss by telling us all about Abie's 'immigrant saga'. Thank god for small mercies!

The actual stories of the ladies ARE interesting, which is why I am so frustrated at the lack of distinction between them. Some of the incidents and cultural context revealed by the aunts are fascinating. For me, the idea that a woman can simply become a man by giving up feminine advantages (lol!) was new. I knew this happened in many Islamic cultures but not so much in African ones.

I am not sure I will recommend this book, but it's not really all bad. If you can keep track, it might be actually worth a read.

[Louise · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not just a good story, it is many good stories. When Aminatta Forna puts pen to paper, magic happens.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aminatta Forna's prose is stunning! I was swept away by her imagery and description. The stories themselves are heavy with meaning, passion, tenacity, and the richness of their setting. I feel more complete as a person, and as a woman, for having read this.

[Carolien · Rating 4 out of 5]

Adie receives a letter to inform her that the family's coffee plantation is waiting for her. On arrival she finds four of her aunts waiting for her, half-sisters of her grandfather's 11 wives. Each woman tells her 4 stories that illustrates how the country changed between 1926 and 2003. The structure takes a bit of getting used to and one has to keep your wits about you to keep up with each story, but beautifully written.

[☕Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ratings:

Writing 5
Story line 5
Characters 4
Impact 4

Overall rating 4.5

[Missy J · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Ancestor Stones" was written by Aminatta Forna who is half Scottish and half Sierra Leonean.
The novel is set in the West African country of Sierra Leone and reads like a heartfelt dedication to the author's homeland.

The story traces the lives of four half-sisters (Asana, Mariama, Hawa and Serah), who all share the same father from 1926 up to 1999. Written in a wonderful vignette style, we get to see four women in four different stages of their lives; (1) childhood and relationship with their mother, (2) early adulthood which can include anything from marriage, work and even education for some, (3) adulthood which may or may not see their mother's tribulations repeated in the daughter's life, and finally (4) old age, which was tragically ravaged by war (Sierra Leone underwent a horrific civil war from 1991-2002).

Forna definitely opened my eyes to another culture. We get to see how polygamous relationships (the senior wife holds a lot more power than the co-wives lower down the rank) and divorce work West African style, how European ways creep into their realities (wearing shoes, missionary education, voting as political participation, mining companies, Western mainstream culture) and how war is experienced. Forna presents us all these themes delicately without imposing any judgement on either the characters or the readers. I really appreciated that aspect.

However, I struggled with the writing and the vignette style of story-telling. I felt like being tossed into the unknown and having had to piece together the story by myself. I constantly referred back to the family tree at the beginning of the book and also scribbled on my bookmark little notes of each character's story. A heavy air of mystery permeates Forna's writing and sometimes it wasn't clear what was going on. This book requires your utmost attention, you cannot just skim through the pages. Highly recommend this to people who are interested in Africa.

[Abby Hastings · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was incredibly well-written. The short story style kept my attention and I liked the way she wrote about this time in history from the women’s perspective, which is often not as focused on

[Joana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Esta obra é formada pelos percursos de vida, contados na primeira pessoa, de quatro mulheres da Serra Leoa. Abie é uma jovem natural deste país, cujo pai viajou para a Europa, o que fez com que ela recebesse uma educação de carácter ocidental. Embora visitasse esporadicamente a sua terra natal, acaba por adiar constantemente uma nova visita, devido á instabilidade política vivida no país, até que recebe uma carta de um dos seus primos informando-a de que herdou uma plantação de café do seu avô, um rico guerreiro, e que a faz regressar. No seu país, mergulha nas recordações de algumas das suas tias, filhas de quatro das onze esposas do seu avô, um rico guerreiro. Aquelas confiam-lhe todas as lembranças do seu passado, desde a infância, aos casamentos, às desilusões e à velhice.
As histórias destas mulheres revelam parte da história e da cultura africanas, permitindo recriar o ambiente social deste país ao longo do século XX, nomeadamente a cultura patriarcal, as tradições que à séculos se cumprem e as perturbações políticas vividas na época colonial e na guerra que se lhe seguiu.
Gostei de ler este livro, na medida em que me transmitiu conhecimentos interessantes sobre a cultura deste país. Contudo, na minha opinião o livro transmite poucos conhecimentos rigorosos sobre a evolução política, sendo as informações passadas pouco esclarecedoras acerca da História nacional.
Por outro lado, a narrativa dos acontecimentos não foi capaz de me envolver. Não me parece haver uma linha de acção, transversal às quatro histórias, contadas em paralelo, que mantenha a coesão entre todas. O alternar entre as histórias das protagonistas, passadas em momentos temporais e espaços semelhantes e que não estão suficientemente interligadas, leva a que o leitor vá esquecendo os percursos das várias personagens, perdendo-se no livro.
No entanto, apesar destes aspectos negativos, esta foi uma leitura que me deu prazer, pois permitiu-me obter, de uma forma suave e nada maçadora, bastantes conhecimentos acerca de uma cultura que desconhecia.

[Tumelo Moleleki · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a challenge for me for most of its expanse but towards the end I believe I had fallen into rythm with it. Always sad and angering to read about life in the times of great oppression of Africans. Greater always is the injustice both the colonists and African men meted on African women. And the psychology at play when these women are gatekeepers of these injuries against themselves and their sisters, daughters, mothers, grand and great grandmothers. Their friends too.

[Inge Vermeire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Een heerlijk boek. Het boek vertelt de geschiedenis van Sierra Leone aan de hand van de levensverhalen van vier Afrikaanse vrouwen - zalig om zo ondergedompeld te worden in Afrika. Ik vond het boek ook prachtig geschreven - vol prachtige beelden. Aminatta Forna is een nieuwe ontdekking - ik kijk ernaar uit om ander werk van haar te lezen.

[Marieke · Rating 4 out of 5]

An absolutely beautiful book. I'm not sure what else i can say about it...stories through time, family, home, identity, change, love...

[Saleh MoonWalker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Onvan : Ancestor Stones - Nevisande : Aminatta Forna - ISBN : 871139448 - ISBN13 : 9780871139443 - Dar 336 Safhe - Saal e Chap : 2006

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of stories that follow the lives of a group of women based in Sierra Leone. Overall I found these tales fascinating and a couple of them very moving.

[Tawallah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ancestor Stones is the debut novel of Aminatta Forna which is loosely based on Sierra Leone. Told in the voice of four cousins - Asana, Hawa, Seraph and Mariama - the author paints a tale that illustrates both their viewpoint and that of the times in which they lived. This was best told as a loosely inter-connected short stories from childhood to old age.

In the rural homeland of Rofathane, a coffee plantation, the patriarch Gibli Kholifa acquires eleven wives by time of his death. It is from four of these wives that our narrators arise. Asana is the daughter of the first wife, Seraph from the tenth wife with a scandalous past, Hawa from a favorite wife and Mariama(Mary) from the third wife Sakkie. It is through their eyes, the readers learn more about the turmoil that exists in the 1920s-1930s, 1950s, 1980s and then in 1996-8 with the resulting civil war. It is a family saga but it seen through the lens of limited role that women played as well as a longer view of their country. The story is rich in the ways that women learn to deal with grief, jealousy, bad marriages, betrayal but also their interaction with religion, racism and colonialism.
Though much of the book may seem stereotypical at times, there is a refreshing honesty that arises from these tales being passed onto a new generation. The beauty lies in having this kind of story written where characters struggle with all that life throws at them with quite limited resources. As events move towards the civil war and its violence, the author chooses not to linger on the violence per se but on its sudden nature to those living through the events, the aftermath of understanding the logic of why and the future for that family.

A love letter to women especially the older generation who chose to forge a path for their happiness but in the end learned to accept who they were. They were shaped by their mothers and the place of their childhood.

[WeltDeLibros · Rating 3 out of 5]

Como parte del reto lector de marzo, para la lectura de un libro feminista me decidí por este libro en concreto, guiándome solo por el título (la verdad). Ha sido sin embargo una lectura acertada aunque no tan apasionante como esperaba.

La acción transcurre en un pueblo africano, más concretamente en Sierra Leona aunque en ningún momento se hace referencia al país africano, y sus protagonistas son cinco mujeres, cinco hermanas de distintas épocas y distintas madres.

Todas ellas contarán sus historias a su sobrina Abie, heredera de los terrenos de su abuelo y algo desvinculada de su país natal. No obstante Abie también es heredera de una cultura ancestral que no debe perderse y de ahí que sus tías cuenten sus idas y venidas a la situación actual.

El libro me ha parecido interesante, y tras las historias personales de las cinco hermanas vemos un transfondo socio-político que irá desde el colonialismo a las turbulentas y sangrientas sucesiones de dictadores.

La evolución de un país contada desde un punto de vista femenino, un feminismo en África que tenemos poco idealizado, ya que siempre miramos al gran continente como un conjunto de sociedades patriarcales donde la presencia de la mujer se relega a un papel secundario.

No es para nada así, y de hecho este libro trata de eso, de la superación y lucha de cinco mujeres en representación de millones de ellas que buscan lo que por derecho les corresponde, la igualdad.

Como contrapartida en algunos momentos la trama se me ha hecho lenta, a pesar de la agilidad de su prosa.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aminatta Forna is one of my favorite authors. She has the ability to truly give a sense of place and culture. Abie returns to Sierra Leone to claim her inheritance, the Kholifa Estate. While there she asks her four aunts (half-sisters from the same father) their life stories, from childhood to old age. From village life, to city life, and beyond.

I gave it three stars because I had so much trouble distinguishing the characters. I had to keep going back to the chapter title to determine which character was speaking. I think this is a book that I will have to revisit, it may just need another reading. Having said that I absolutely loved The Hired Man, and The Memory of Love by Forna.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a novel, but it feels like a family oral history project in which four aunts from rural Sierra Leone tell the story of their lives starting in the 1920’s through 1999. It is the story of the struggle of a culture to survive western colonial and eastern Islamic pressures. The stories provide the clues and the sparks to allow the original culture to have a chance to survive.

By chance, I read this book right after reading Confessions of a Pagan Nun which tells the same story of colonial outside forces destroying a culture – this time in 6th century Ireland. The parallels were startling.

[Leah · Rating 4 out of 5]

"No, life isn't a straight line. It is a circle, whose slow and gentle bend we fail to spot, until we realise we are back where we started."

Abie asks her aunties - Asana, Hawa, Mariama, and Serah - the story of their lives, growing up the daughters of the wives of a wealthy, African plantation owner. Spanning almost 80 years, I was fully immersed in not only their culture but their country's history. Watching as Islam and Christianity infringe on their Pagan beliefs, as wives wrestled with (or settled into) their roles and hierarchy, as daughters battled expectations and modern choices. I love multi-generational stories, especially those that center women and the myriad joys and challenges inherent to womanhood; Ancestor Stones captivated this reader. The ending was magical and perfect.

4 stars
(And I look forward to reading more by Forna.)

[Diana Julião · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 ☆