Crooked Plow: A Novel (Verso Fiction)
The prize winning international bestseller - 800,000 copies sold in Brazil
Shortlisted for The International Booker Prize 2024
Longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award
'I heard our grandmother asking what we were doing.'"Say something!" she demanded, threatening to tear out our tongues. Little did she know that one of us was holding her tongue in her hand.'
Deep in Brazil's neglected Bahia hinterland, two sisters find an ancient knife beneath their grandmother's bed and, momentarily mystified by its power, decide to taste its metal. The shuddering violence that follows marks their lives and binds them together forever.
Heralded as a new masterpiece, this fascinating and gripping story about the lives of subsistence farmers in Brazil's poorest region, three generations after the abolition of slavery, is at once fantastic and realist, covering themes of family, spirituality, slavery and its aftermath, and political struggle.
Translated by Johnny Lorenz.
Shortlisted for The International Booker Prize 2024
Longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award
'I heard our grandmother asking what we were doing.'"Say something!" she demanded, threatening to tear out our tongues. Little did she know that one of us was holding her tongue in her hand.'
Deep in Brazil's neglected Bahia hinterland, two sisters find an ancient knife beneath their grandmother's bed and, momentarily mystified by its power, decide to taste its metal. The shuddering violence that follows marks their lives and binds them together forever.
Heralded as a new masterpiece, this fascinating and gripping story about the lives of subsistence farmers in Brazil's poorest region, three generations after the abolition of slavery, is at once fantastic and realist, covering themes of family, spirituality, slavery and its aftermath, and political struggle.
Translated by Johnny Lorenz.
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Community Reviews
This isn't a review but a question to readers who have finished the book. I have searched online and even reading other reviews with spoilers, I have not managed to find a description of how the book ends. I had to rush the end of the book because it was coming due. And at the end, the new land owner is killed -- I understood that clearly. I think what happened was that Bibiana (the older sister) killed him and I think she did this killing while under the control or influence of the encantada (spirit) who is narrating this section of the story. But I am uncertain if I identified the correct knife-wielding sister and whether the encantada influenced the deed. I would appreciate input.
Review-wise, I will say: of the four novels set in Latin America that I have read so far, I liked this book the best.
Review-wise, I will say: of the four novels set in Latin America that I have read so far, I liked this book the best.
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