In My Hands Today…

My Lost Cuba – Celso Gonzalez-Falla

18086453Dramatic history, lush scenery, and a colorful cast transport us to the time of Cuba’s turning point – the late 1950s Set against the tropical landscape of Cuba’s countryside and the glamour of 1950s Havana, this moving story of Cuban life at a pivotal time in the country’s rich history will resonate with anyone who has experienced the loss of family or homeland.

It is 1958, the last year of Fulgencio Batista’s dictatorship. Mike, the son of Don Miguel, a wealthy land owner and rancher, is summoned home from his MBA studies in the United States because of his father’s failing health. Still recovering from the loss of his wife, Mike’s return is an immediate tonic for Don Miguel. Caught between his family obligations and his desire to pursue his own dreams, Mike quickly finds himself succumbing to his father’s desire for him to take over the responsibilities of running the family ranch.

As Mike settles back into the life he was groomed for, Don Miguel, reinvigorated, spends more and more time socialising in Havana. Changes are happening everywhere. The government is encroaching on civil liberties and social and political upheaval is in the air. There are rumblings about Castro’s guerillas organising in the mountains. On the ranch, long-time employees of Don Miguel resent the changes that Mike is making, setting the stage for a confrontation that changes the lives of everyone involved.

In My Hands Today…

A Different Sky – Meira Chand

8238182Singapore, 1927. Three young people are starting to question whether this in between island can ever truly be their home.

Mei Lan comes from a famous Chinese dynasty but yearns to free herself from its stifling traditions. Ten-year-old Howard seethes at the indignities heaped on his fellow Eurasians by the colonial British. Raj, fresh off the boat from India, wants only to work hard and become a successful businessman.

As the years pass, and the Second World War sweeps through the east, with the Japanese occupying Singapore, the three are thrown together in unexpected ways, and tested to breaking point.

In My Hands Today…

City of Veils – Zoë Ferraris

7168509The body of a young woman is discovered on the grimy sands of Jeddah beach; soon afterwards, a strong-minded American woman finds herself alone and afraid in the most repressive city on earth when her husband suddenly disappears.

Investigating police officer Osama Ibrahim, forensic scientist Katya Hijazi and her friend, the strictly devout Bedouin guide Nayir Sharqi join forces to search out the truth in the scorching city streets and the vast, lethal emptiness of the desert beyond.

Breathtakingly fast-paced, sure-footed and thrilling, this novel paints in dazzling colours a city of veils in which more is hidden than is revealed, and nothing is what it seems.

In My Hands Today…

Darshan – Amrit Chima

18493146In 1911 rural India, Baba Singh Toor commits a shocking act of violence to avenge a crippling loss, setting a secret in motion that will haunt—and claim—the Toors for generations.

Hardened by a crime for which he was never caught, Baba’s past casts shadows over his sons, even as the era of British Colonial tyranny and oppression reaches its height. In the distant colony of 1940s Fiji, his son, Manmohan, a virtuoso of enterprise, bears the burden of his father’s sin, plagued by an all-consuming insecurity that suffocates his own children. And twenty-five years later in San Francisco, Darshan—inextricably linked to his grandfather, Baba Singh, by both birth and fate—finds himself dragged to the centre of conflict. Held accountable for the Toors’ dark history, he labours to honour his name—meaning one who is blessed with clarity of sight—attempting to keep the family from irreparably splintering apart.

In My Hands Today…

Bone Mountain – Eliot Pattison

435631When disgraced former inspector, Shan Tao Yun joins a group of reverent Tibetans returning a sacred artefact to its home, it seems he has at last found the peace he has struggled for since leaving prison. What starts as a spiritual pilgrimage, however, quickly turns into a desperate flight through the Tibetan wilderness as the outlawed monk who guides them is murdered and Sham discovers that the artefact has recently been stolen from the Chinese army.

But why is the army so desperate to find the artefact entrusted to Shan? Why is an aged medicine lama being stalked by government agents? Why has an American woman, a geologist for an oil company, abandoned the project and fled into the mountains? Shan discovers not answers, but only new mysteries as he is drawn to such unexpected places as the raucous headquarters base of the Western oil venture and a monastery that seems more attuned to the teachings of the party than those of Buddha. And the further he travels into the mountains, the more Shan realises that what is at stake is not only justice but the spiritual survival of those who have joined his strange quest. At the heart of Pattison’s powerful tale is a story of a brave, oppressed people who have learned to endure by drawing strength from their land and their rich spiritual traditions.