Caly recommends... June Book Club | Uprising - Tahmima Anam

Caly says... A fierce, magical and devastatingly beautiful novel following the lives of women and children sold into slavery. Weaving together the darkest corners of the Bengal Delta with voices of defiance, moments of humour and climate fiction, Anam's uncompromising fable is a brilliantly galvanizing dedication to protest, song, and the inevitability of change.

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On a desolate, sinking island, a group of children witness their mothers living lives of cruelty and servitude. Bought and sold by Amma, the sadistic madam who was once herself sold into slavery, the women have learned to accept their fate.

Yet their children weave fantastic tales of escape, imagining that someday they will leave the island and enjoy a life of freedom. When Kusum Khan, a young, educated woman from the city, is forcibly brought to the island, she too is subjected to Amma's violent induction. Yet Kusum refuses to yield, and soon the collective complacency of her fellow prisoners turns into ferocity and defiance. Together, they begin a rebellion that will upend their island, their world and the very order of things.

An earth-shattering drama of resistance and female power, Uprising gives voice to the silenced through the story of a revolution no one saw coming.