Cutting For Stone-Abraham Verghese

Cutting For Stone
Abraham Verghese
Knopf, Feb 6 2009, $26.95
ISBN: 9780375414497

In 1947 dedicated to the Lord Sister Mary Joseph Praise leaves Kerala, India for a missionary assignment in Yemen. The voyage mostly by sea is grueling, but Sister Mary has the Lord accompanying her so has no ill affects. She saves the life of Dr. Thomas Stone who is heading to Ethiopia.

Sister Mary and Dr. Stone meet for the first time since their sea trek at Missing Hospital in Addis Ababa and she provides him comfort. Sister Mary dies during child birth, but her twin sons Shiva and Marion survive; Thomas never knew although she wrote him a letter explaining all. Adopted by physicians at Missing Hospital, who hide Mary’s letter, the brothers thrive over the decades until each becomes a doctor.

This is a terrific twenty century epic that wonderfully blends a family drama and medical practices into an Ethiopian political thriller. The well written story line is told by one of the siblings, who vividly explains, the love he and his twin received from his adopted parents, his discovery of the letter, and especially medicine in war torn Ethiopia and in the battle zone of the New York City slums. Although coincidence allows the major early events to occur the way the do, fans will relish this deep tale of two adopted brothers becoming doctors just like their parents and the biological father they do not know.

Harriet Klausner