White Dog Fell from the Sky: A Novel
White Dog Fell from the Sky: A Novel book cover

White Dog Fell from the Sky: A Novel

Hardcover – January 3, 2013

by
Price
$16.25
Format
Hardcover
Pages
368
Publisher
Viking
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0670026401
Dimensions
6.23 x 1.15 x 9.27 inches
Weight
1.2 pounds

Description

From Booklist When he sees his activist friend thrown under a train by the apartheid defense force in 1976, medical student Isaac Muthethe gets himself smuggled in a hearse across the border from South Aftrica to Botswana, where he finds work as a gardener for Alice Mendelssohn (Don’t call me Madam), from Rhode Island, who is studying the cave paintings of the earliest humans, the ancient San people. Can Isaac get a letter to his mother in South Africa? Alice is in love with Ian, her English neighbor, whose secret mission is to cut cattle-farm wire fences so that wild animals can roam free and not perish for lack of water. Then Isaac is extradited and tortured. From the first page, the moving personal stories dramatize the big issues of ecology, politics, borders, race relations, art, and history. The rock art of the first nomadic peoples is beyond tourism. And the loss of thousands of wild animals left dying of thirst by fences put up to protect cattle ranches will strike a universal chord. --Hazel Rochman " White Dog Fell From the Sky catches the soul of compassion. It is one of the wisest, most comprehensive, most compelling books I've ever read. Neither human nor beast is treated sentimentally, but the capacity to care is celebrated here in a way that is politically and personally cogent.xa0 It's a wild and wooly story in a far away land, yet its relevance is present in our own imperfect hearts: who and how to love and when and why to stop. Here's the real thing, a book of genuine intellect and inspiration, superbly written, fascinating."- Sena Jeter Naslund, New York Times bestselling author of Ahab's Wife , Abundance and Adam & Eve “Magic, friendship, the tragedy of apartheid and the triumph of loyalty are recounted in poetic, powerful prose by this unconventional and intelligent writer. Shattering and uplifting.”—Kuki Gallmann, author of I Dreamed of Africa “Eleanor Morse captures the magic of the African landscape and the terror and degradation of life under apartheid…[She] channels her fascination with the factious regions into her courageous characters, whose story roars along and arrives, finally, at hope.”— O, The Oprah Magazine "There are not enough adjectives to describe the strength of this story. Eleanor Morse has written a character driven novel with character. White Dog Fell From the Sky has a life of its own that blends reality, insight, observation, and nuance with such ease and grace you forget you are reading...A powerful story of love—love of a person, a people, a land and living with purpose...Emotionally riveting, heartbreaking, and at times unbearable, while simultaneously embracing hope, insight, and a sense of perpetual mystery. Each sentence is more beuatiful than the last."—Gabriel Constans, New York Journal of Books "White Dog Fell from the Sky is that rare thing: a convinced and convincing love story. Past that—and this novel’s reach is wide—it reminds us, tellingly, how Africa is mother of us all.”—Madison Smartt Bell, author of All Souls’ Rising and The Color of Night “Big issues of ecology, politics, borders, race relations, art, and history.”—Hazel Rochman, Booklist "Morse brings the natural world of Botswana to vivid life."— Kirkus Reviews “Brutal and beautiful…it explores the strength and friendship, the bonds of love, and the inhumanity regimes are capable of inflicting upon individuals…Morse’s unflinching portrayals of extremes of loyalty and cruelty make for an especially memorable novel.”— Publishers Weekly “Morse’s descriptions of the vast landscapes of Botswana are specific and ravishing.”— BookPage “Lyrical and quite beautiful, with searing descriptions of the dusty earth, unforgiving sun, and stark skies.”— Entertainment Weekly “The infinite, healing power of love is put to the test…Morse writes heartbreakingly of isolation, loss, and the soul-deadening effect of torture. Her mesmerizing descriptions of Africa will leave readers wondering how a continent of such beauty can harbor so much evil…This is for readers unafraid to plumb the depths of human emotions.”— Library Journal “Breathtaking beauty, next to danger and hardships and make-do living…Witness it in all its terrible randomness.”— The Dallas Morning News “Eleanor Morse writes with sympathy and precision, sensitive to the dislocations of race and class – the grave imbalance of power…The book unfolds into stories both tragic and transcendent.”— Boston.com Eleanor Morse is the author of An Unexpected Forest , which won the Independent Publisher’s Gold Medalist Award for the Best Regional Fiction in the Northeast U.S., and was selected winner of Best Published Fiction by the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance at the 2008 Maine Literary Awards. She lives on Peaks Island, Maine. Read more

Features & Highlights

  • An extraordinary novel of love, friendship, and betrayal for admirers of Abraham Verghese and Edwidge Danticat
  • Eleanor Morse’s rich and intimate portrait of Botswana, and of three people whose intertwined lives are at once tragic and remarkable, is an absorbing and deeply moving story.In apartheid South Africa in 1977, medical student Isaac Muthethe is forced to flee his country after witnessing a friend murdered by white members of the South African Defense Force. He is smuggled into Botswana, where he is hired as a gardener by a young American woman, Alice Mendelssohn, who has abandoned her Ph.D. studies to follow her husband to Africa. When Isaac goes missing and Alice goes searching for him, what she finds will change her life and inextricably bind her to this sunburned, beautiful land.Like the African terrain that Alice loves, Morse’s novel is alternately austere and lush, spare and lyrical. She is a writer of great and wide-ranging gifts.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(262)
★★★★
25%
(218)
★★★
15%
(131)
★★
7%
(61)
★
23%
(201)

Most Helpful Reviews

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"We are doorways, openings into something greater..."

Every now and then, someone asks me, "Why do I read?" My answer is because of books like this - a book that embraces me in its world, shattering my heart and then restoring it again.

The first character we meet is Isaac Muthethe, a young medical student who was forced to flee South Africa for Botswana after witnessing his friend's death by the white South African Defense Force. Upon arriving there, he is quickly "adopted" by a skinny white dog. Fate brings him - and the dog -- to the home of Alice Mendelssohn, who works for the Botswana government and whose marriage is quickly disintegrating. Despite his lack of experience, he assumes the role of her gardener.

The characters, who fall into an unlikely friendship, are superbly drawn: Isaac, a serious man who never relinquishes his dignity and Alice, who falls deeply in love with a hard-to-tame man named Ian who opens the door to emotions she felt she no longer possessed. When Alice returns from an intense weekend with Ian, she finds that Isaac is missing...and the story develops into unchartered territory.

The theme, again and again, circles back to our place in the universe and how little we know. "We are doorways, openings into something greater than ourselves, something that we don't understand and will never understand. We have nothing precious in and of ourselves. We are only precious in that we are part of something that is too big to know," Isaac reflects, early on.

And Ian, Alice's soul-mate, later reflects on the same thing when he views paintings from the !KungSan: "Whether you believe in God or not, the artists understood that they weren't at the center of the universe, that humans are a small part, surrounded by the power and beauty of the whole."

All of these imperfect individuals - all in the process of growth - are connected to each other and to White Dog, who represents - I believe - a spiritual guardian who watches over them. "White Dog would not leave his side. She knew his grief, this dog, who was more than a dog, this dog who had fallen from the sky."

This book succeeds in the best of ways: revealing what it means to be human, how the power of love and loyalty triumphs over hatred and discord. It also succeeds as a window into Botswana and as a revelation of our broader connection to the entire animal universe, and the fences we build (literally and figuratively) to keep others at a distance. It's one of the best I've read so far this year.
28 people found this helpful
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Read it before someone makes a movie out of it

This is a great book, with strong characters and an excellent storyline. The descriptions of the era and location set the scene very well, and as the book progresses it becomes harder and harder to put down. Highly recommend.
10 people found this helpful
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A Not-So-Great Book Fell from the Sky

So promising, so disappointing. White Dog Fell from the Sky is a story about a young black South African medical student named Isaac who, after fleeing from apartheid South Africa to Gaborone, Botswana, befriends a white woman named Alice who hires him to be her gardener. I'm giving the book two stars instead of one because reading the book was somewhat of a cinematic experience; I found it absorbing and vivid. Sadly, the book amounts to little more than a trite meditation on unlikely friendships, rife with racial stereotypes. (The angst-filled, progressive white do-gooder drowning in her own existential crisis and the benevolent, one-dimensional, quietly dignified, sinless Other whose sole purpose in life seems to be to teach the aforementioned, multi-dimensional white character how to live boldly and love better.) And that really is a bummer because Isaac's character had so much potential. And while I'm being critical, I'll also add that the maudlin love affair between Alice and the wild, untamable beast that is Ian (yet another angst-filled, complex, kinda annoying, do-gooder white person) held absolutely zero appeal to me. And, unfortunately, that affair takes up a huge swath of the book, further marginalizing Isaac, the one character who just might have been interesting. I say pass on this one.
9 people found this helpful
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Incredible!!!

The cover art really grabbed me, and anything having to do with animals strikes a cord with me as well,so I knew I'd like this book--I just didn't realize this would be one of the finest books I have read in a very long time; it is truly a character driven novel. Each of the characters are so real and fleshed out that they hum with life from the page. From the moment I began reading, I was enthralled. I found myself re-reading passages just to be able to absorb the beauty and poetry of the language. This novel took me on a journey to Africa during the worst time of apartheid--I lived within its pages. White Dog is just as much a part of this story as Alice and Isaac.

Isaac is forced to flee South Africa for Botswana after he witnesses his best friend killed by the Defense Force. He abandons everything, including his medical studies in the hope of a better life. He is smuggled over the border in a hearse, and summarily dumped in the middle of a street. Enter White Dog. She is much more than a dog; she is a spiritual guide sent to protect Isaac and later Alice and two children that come into Alice's care.

This novel efortlessly weaves together two story lines, and the reader is better for it. Alice is a woman who appears much older than she is; she's a woman with a fire in her belly, but she put her own life on hold to marry Lawrence and move to Botswana. The marriage crumbles soon after the novel opens and Alice meet Ian who is her soulmate. Amid all the sadness and violence, this is a story of incredible tenderness and redemtion. If you are reading this review and considering reading this book, I envy you because for you this wonderful story is just beginning.
9 people found this helpful
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The Great Chain of Being

This starts with the promise of a powerful novel set in southern Africa during the last desperate years of Apartheid, around 1977-8. It does not quite maintain its quality -- or rather, it reveals itself as something more romantic, less urgent -- but it may be about an even more important topic: the nature of life itself.

Isaac Muthethe, a young South African medical student, escapes into neighboring Botswana hidden in a hearse. The first creature he meets is a stray white dog, who attaches herself to him. He also encounters a former school friend, Amen, who has moved to Botswana to organize cross-border guerilla actions for the ANC. Although Isaac wants no part in Amen's activities, he is grateful for his offer of a place to stay (a mistake, as it turns out). Isaac eventually finds work as a gardener for Alice Mendelssohn, an American working for the government. Although neither knows much about gardening, Isaac puts his heart and soul into it, and soon he and Alice have struck up a close relationship of mutual respect. Then calamity strikes.

It is at this point, about a third of the way through the book, that the story, in my opinion, loses steam. It suddenly becomes more about Alice than Isaac, and although the author (an American who spent some years in Botswana herself) presumably calls upon personal knowledge to portray her, she is the less interesting of the two characters. We sympathize at the break-up of her marriage, though her experience is by no means unusual. We see her mixture and joy and apprehension at finding, as she thinks, someone whom she can love for life, but I could not entirely buy into this. The shift of focus does not stop there. The story, which began as a tight seed-pod involving only two people, extends shoots in all directions as Morse explores their separate lives, and then the lives of many of those with whom they come in contact. In conventional terms, it results in a distinct lack of tension, especially as Isaac himself is virtually sidelined. But I gradually realized that Morse may have other goals in mind.

Late in the book, Alice has a vision of the scale of the universe, from tiniest neutrino to largest galaxy, and her insignificant place in it as an individual human. But an essential link in the great chain of being. I think the author's real subject is the interconnectedness of each part of that chain: black to white, men to women, old to young, rich to poor, human beings to animals, animals to the land, the land to the elements of drought and flood, life, death, and renewal. At one point, an old San woman is introduced, playing no essential part in the story, but forming an absolutely crucial link in the chain described above. The White Dog too is a symbol of the continuity of existence, appearing from nowhere, patiently enduring, but giving unquestioning loyalty to those who are kind to her.

It is a fine theme, but it comes at the expense of narrative focus. The political drama of persecution, imprisonment, torture, and death is the diametric opposite of the theme of the brotherhood of all creation; that is of course the point. But the two elements involve very different approaches to storytelling, and I don't think Morse quite finds the way to reconcile them. The cute title and playful style of the cover suggest something almost whimsical, a kind of fable. The novel itself is not that, but it does place overmuch emphasis on romance, and cannot totally avoid sentiment. It began as five-star writing, and moved me a good deal at the end, but I cannot forget that almost 200 pages in the middle felt like four-star territory. But high four-star, really high.
7 people found this helpful
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Little history and lots of romance

Having spent time in Botswana, I felt that the history of apartheid was given very little attention and too much time and attention was given to Alice who was not an entirely believable character. Isaac could have been developed into a memorable character and the story could have been developed into a truly memorable book.
7 people found this helpful
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A fabulous read!

This novel has a stunning beginning, a consistently fascinating story, and even more importantly, an ending that is one of the most rewarding I have read in years. The writing is luminous and the characters are irresistible. Although the book is a keyhole look at a certain time and place in Africa's history, the message is timely, universal, and relevant. Add to that, it is an absorbing love story. Simply, a fabulous read!
4 people found this helpful
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Hauntingly Beautiful Prose, I Had Mixed Feelings About the Story Itself

Set in 1976, White Dog Fell From the Sky weaves together the stories of Isaac, a refugee fleeing from Apartheid in South Africa, and Alice, an American woman living in Botswana. Isaac's story was by far my favorite part of the book, and I would give his part of the story 5 stars. His thoughts are insightful and eloquent and he is very brave. With just the clothes on his back, he is forced to flee South Africa after witnessing a friend's murder. I did not find Alice's story nearly as engrossing. Her marriage falls apart and she begins a relationship with a man she meets on a business trip. Her relationship problems seem unimportant contrasted to Isaac's struggle. I found myself hurrying through the chapters about her to find out what would happen to Isaac. I would give her part of the book 3 stars, hence the four star average. Morse's writing was beautifully evocative, I will look forward to her next novel.
3 people found this helpful
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During Apartheid

This author's prose was strong, meaningful, and elicited feelings for what individuals see, feel, think, and go through as well as how they measure up to and for themselves. I was very touched by the stories, and the manner in which the author was able to deliver it to me personally. She is a gifted author.
3 people found this helpful
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Vistas of South Africa

Isaac Muthethe, a young medical student from South Africa, witnesses the brutal murder of a friend by the South African Defense Force. Fearing for his own life under the apartheid regime of the mid-1970s, he flees his homeland, leaving behind his family and his dreams of a career.

Dumped from a hearse into a dusty field just inside the border of Botswanna, Isaac awakens to find a white dog sitting next to him. The dog becomes his faithful companion, following him into the city of Gabarone, to the home of a resistance fighter, and ultimately to the house of an American woman who hires him to be her gardener. But Isaac has no papers, no right to be in the country. Apartheid does not exist in Botswanna, but it's a hostile land of unrelenting heat, choking dust, fences that keep herds of animals from water, government officials intoxicated with power.

Man's capacity to inflict pain on his fellow human beings looms over the novel, as do the vistas of Africa and the devastation wrought on the people and the land. The white dog that fell from the sky is the counterbalance. Her love for Isaac is without condition. No matter what hardships he is forced to endure, her commitment never wavers.

Alice Mendelssohn, the woman who befriends and ultimately saves Isaac, is a symbol of what is good in the world, as is the dog who will not abandon the young man she has chosen as master.

This is a book that explores the extremes of cruelty, but also of loyalty and faithfulness. It paints an extraordinary picture of a land torn to pieces by apartheid, but a land where love and faith can ultimately triumph.

White Dog Fell from the Sky is a great read.
3 people found this helpful

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