Leading an “ancient life” in the mountains of Symi, Maria lives isolated with her four sisters and parents. But as her elder sister, 13- year-old Annika’s love for a young man unravels, Maria feels trapped in the middle of a war between her father and her sister. She wants to escape the claustrophobic rural life and live the dream in Egypt, the Promised Land.
The world around Maria changes: electricity enlightens the heroine’s desolate night, and along with it, other miracles arrive, like the radio and the cinema. Maria wants to change too. The novel follows her journey from Egypt, 1931-1945, and her years there as a nurse in the desert, to Athens, 1945-1990, where, as a mother, she will meet the Great Unknown…
A mesmerizing, autobiographical novel that follows the life of a girl, Fakinou’s mother, from the
Italian Occupation, to World War II and on.
Kastaniotis, 2003, 440 P.
