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“Cutting for stone” is Abraham Varghese’s first novel, an epic tale about love, abandonment, betrayal and redemption. The author narrates a saga that spans over three continents and six decades, in the traditional storytelling mode. Varghese pays meticulous attention to detail and weaves the threads of the numerous story lines and sub-plots into a cohesive opus. Varghese reveals himself as a sensitive writer, aware of emotions that he manages to translate into words in a remarkable fashion.
The story starts with Sister Mary Joseph Praise, an Indian nun, saving the life of British surgeon Thomas Stone during a perilous voyage from India to Yemen in 1947, and the subsequent bond that develops between the two. Much of the story centers around Mission Hospital, Addis Ababa and around Hema and Ghosh, the twins born to Mary and Thomas.