The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears

by Dinaw Mengestu

Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution after witnessing soldiers beat his father to the point of certain death, selling off his parents' jewelry to pay for passage to the United States. Now he finds himself running a grocery store in a poor African-American neighborhood in Washington, D.C. His only companions are two fellow African immigrants who share his feelings of frustration with and bitter nostalgia for their home continent. He realizes that his life has turned out completely different and far more isolated from the one he had imagined for himself years ago.

Soon Sepha's neighborhood begins to change. Hope comes in the form of new neighbors-Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter-who become his friends and remind him of what having a family is like for the first time in years. But when the neighbourhood's newfound calm is disturbed by a series of racial incidents, Sepha may lose everything all over again.

Told in a haunting and powerful first-person narration that casts the streets of Washington, D.C., and Addis Ababa through Sepha's eyes, The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears is a deeply affecting and unforgettable debut novel about what it means to lose a family and a country-and what it takes to create a new home.

(From Publisher).

Dinaw Mengestu is the author of The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears, a Los Angeles Times bestseller and Seattle Reads pick of 2008, as well as the forthcoming novel How To Read the Air. He was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 1978. In 1980, he immigrated to the United States with his mother and sister, joining his father, who had fled Ethiopia during the Red Terror. He is a graduate of Georgetown University and Columbia University’s MFA program in fiction and the recipient of a 2006 fellowship in fiction from the New York Foundation for the Arts and a 5 Under 35 Award from the National Book Foundation in 2007. He has written for Rolling Stone and Harper's, among other publications. He lives in New York City.

A ruefully told tale of a relationship between people from different cultural backrounds. Very well described.

Mr Mengestu's story of love and immigration features Sepha Stephanos, an Ethiopian grocery store owner who is dealing with the conflicting ideals of his love for a Caucasian woman and his loyalty to his heritage in this moving picture of cultural acclimation.

Humanizes the immigrant experience through the fresh and insightful perspectives of these superbly drawn characters. Heart rending and richly rewarding.