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LaughingOne
Jan 07, 2013LaughingOne rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
This novel carries us from 1919 to 1961 or so in a town in South Africa, focusing on one family - Master, Madam, son and daughter - and their maid (handmaid) and her daughter (and her daugher). It is written mostly from the perspective of Ada, the handmaid's daughter, but also has diary notes of Madam, showing the same events from different views. The story caught me up and carried me along through drought, war, racism, unexpected kindnesses, illness and death, birth and the issues of different skin colours and, finally apartheid. Ada is a young black woman who is nurtured by her mother and the white Madam, learns to read and write, to play the piano, and to have convictions that she holds to with integrity and dignity. This book is an inside look at life in a country that deals with skin colour differences in pretty extreme ways. Well worth reading.