PURPLE HIBISCUS

Shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction An intoxicating story that is at once distinctly feminine, African and universal OBSERVER Fifteen-year-old Kambili lives in fear of her father, a charismatic yet violent Catholic patriarch who, although generous and well-respected in the community, is repressive and fanatically religious at home. Escape and the discovery of a new, liberated way of life come when Nigeria is shaken by a military coup, forcing Kambili and her brother to live at their aunt s home, a noisy place full of laughter. The visit will lift the silence from her world and, in time, unlock a terrible, bruising secret at the heart of her family life. An extraordinary debut, Purple Hibiscus is a novel about the blurred lines between the old gods and the new, childhood and adulthood, love and hatred.