From Publishers Weekly
Acclaimed South African novelist Brink (The Rights of Desire; Devil's Valley; etc.) paints a harrowing picture of German South-West Africa (modern-day Namibia) in his latest novel, focusing on a German initiative to import hundreds of women to Africa for the colonists at the turn of the last century. Hanna X is an orphan who spends her early years in Germany trying to catch on as a domestic with a number of families, only to have the sexual advances of various libidinous husbands ruin her efforts to find a stable situation. Hanna thinks she has escaped the world of male domination when she receives permission to emigrate to South Africa, but her escape backfires. Raped and mutilated by brutal German officer Hauptmann Buhlke, she is taken to a horrific outpost known as the Frauenstein, where the abuse continues. The book's surreal, fragmentary first half, in which the events of Hanna's childhood are interspersed with the harrowing details of her arrival in Africa, is followed by a riveting second half, in which Hanna escapes the Frauenstein and tracks down Buhlke with the help of another abused woman, Katja, and a Herero tribesman, Kahapa, whom the two women rescue from a savage German farmer. The trio quickly become a small vigilante posse as they journey to Windhoek to find Buhlke, and their efforts to turn the tables on the Germans succeed when they murder a small troop of soldiers and then wipe out a larger group at a garrison. The relentless violence occasionally turns Hanna into a one-dimensional character, but the imagery from this haunting novel will stay with readers, as will the frightening allure of all-consuming hatred: "So beautiful. So singular. So utterly pure. So abundantly full of life." Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Hanna X is a young German woman who, after years of abuse in a Bremen orphanage, escapes to her country's colonies in southwest Africa, only to be even more badly brutalized--mutilated, even--by the men she has volunteered to serve. Disfigured and mute, she is banished to Frauenstein, a desert asylum for broken, unwanted women. When Hanna saves frail young Katja from the violent advances of a drunken soldier by beating him to death, her silent rage comes alive and the tenor of Brink's story shifts from suffering to revenge. Forming a militia from the scarred victims of colonial oppression, natives and immigrant women alike, Hanna declares war on the Reich itself, organizing attacks on German desert outposts and ultimately coming face-to-scarred-face with the persistent shadows of her childhood--as well as the man responsible for her horrible disfigurement. This is familiar territory for Brink, a South African whose explorations of violence, memory, and apartheid have won him praise and media attention. His latest proves provocative by evoking these themes within the unconventional setting of German colonialism. Brendan Driscoll
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


The New York Times Book Review, Aug 3 2003
"A novel of unforgettable power."


The New Yorker, Jun 2 2003
"A shrewd meditation on the dehumanizing power of hatred."


The Baltimore Sun, May 25 2003
"[A] brilliant tale in which sharp glints of hope manage to illumine a near-unbeearably inhumane world."


Los Angeles Times Book Review, Jun 8 2003
"This bloody fable, rooted in bloody reality, is one of Brink's most powerful woorks."


Review
?Brink is one of the crucial writers of our time? A truly horrifying tale, but compassionately and compellingly told.? -- Glasgow Herald

?An astonishing performance?his most profound and most beautiful novel.? -- Irish Times

?Peter Carey, Garcia Marquez, Solzhenitsyn: André Brink must be considered with that class of writer.? -- Guardian

?Harsh, visionary and unsettling.? -- Time Out


From the Trade Paperback edition.


Book Description
With hopes for a better future after a dismal past, a young German woman dreams of escape to her country's colony in South-West Africa. When she learns of the women being transported to the colony to attend to the needs of male settlers, Hanna X takes the leap.

In Africa she is confronted with the harsh realities of colonial life. For resisting the advances of a German officer, she is banished to Frauenstein, a phantasmagoric outpost that is at once a "prison, nunnery, brothel, and shithouse." When the drunken excesses of visiting soldiers threaten the young girl who has become her only companion, Hanna revolts. Mounting a ragtag army of women and native victims of brutality, she sets out on an epic journey to take on the German Reich. Combining the history of colonialism with the myths of Africa, this is an exquisitely written tale of suffering, violence, revenge, and, simply, love.



From the Inside Flap
With years of abuse behind her and a bleak future ahead, a young German woman dreams of her country's colony in South-West Africa. When she learns of the women being transported to the colony to attend to the needs of male settlers, Hanna X takes the leap.

In Africa she is confronted with the harsh realities of colonial life. For resisting the advances of a German officer, She is banished to Frauenstein, a phantasmagoric outpost that is at once a "prison, nunnery, brothel, and shithouse." When the drunken excesses of visiting soldiers threaten the young girl who has become her only companion, Hanna revolts.

Mounting a ragtag army of women and native victims of colonial brutality, she sets out on an epic journey to take on the German Reich. Combining the history of colonialism with the myths of Africa, this is a tale, exquisitely written, of suffering, violence, revenge, and love.

A major work by one of the world's most prominent novelists.



From the Back Cover
"Brink blends history with invention and African myth . . . This bloody fable, rooted in bloody reality, is one of Brink's most powerful works."-Los Angeles Times Book Review

Hanna X is a young German woman who wants to escape her tortured childhood by moving to her country's colony in South-West Africa. Upon arriving, however, she is confronted with the harsh realities of colonial life. For resisting the advances of a German officer, she is banished to Frauenstein, a phantasmagoric outpost that is at once a prison, nunnery, and brothel. When the drunken excesses of visiting soldiers threaten the young girl who has become her only companion, Hanna revolts.
Mounting a ragtag army of women and native victims of colonial brutality, she sets out on an epic journey to take on the German Reich. Combining the history of colonialism with the myths of Africa, this is an exquisitely written tale of suffering, violence, revenge, and love.

André Brink has won South Africa's major literary prize, the CAN, three times and has twice been short-listed for the Booker Prize. He lives in Cape Town, South Africa.



About the Author
ANDRÉ BRINK has won South Africa’s literary prize, the CNA, three times, and has twice been short-listed for the Booker Prize. He lives in Cape Town, South Africa

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"With years of abuse behind her and a bleak future ahead, a young German woman dreams of her country's colony in South-West Africa. When she learns of the women being transported to the colony to attend to the needs of male settlers, Hanna X takes the leap." "In Africa she is confronted with the harsh realities of colonial life. For resisting the advances of a German officer, she is banished to Frauenstein, a phantasmagoric outpost that is at once a "prison, nunnery, brothel, and shithouse." When the drunken excesses of visiting soldiers threaten the young girl who has become her only companion, Hanna revolts." Mounting a ragtag army of women and native victims of colonial brutality, she sets out on an epic journey to take on the German Reich. Combining the history of colonialism with the myths of Africa, this is a tale of suffering, violence, revenge, and love.

FROM THE CRITICS

The New York Times

… at its best, The Other Side of Silence is a novel of unforgettable power. At one point Hanna is cared for by tribal women, who nurse her body with herbal medicines and calm her spirit with their legends, assuring her that ''there is no pain and no badness that a story cannot cure.'' In the context of the novel, this statement can only seem ironic: Hanna's story certainly cannot cure its own pain and badness. Brink's purpose, however, is not to cure the evils of colonialism -- no novelist could do that -- but to probe to the deepest part of their core. — Ruth Franklin

The Los Angeles Times

This bloody fable, rooted in bloody reality, is one of Brink's most powerful works. — Michael Harris

The New Yorker

The fifteenth novel by a prize-winning South African author takes as its point of departure a German program at the turn of the twentieth century whereby women were shipped out to Germany's colonies in South-West Africa (now Namibia) to be wives -- or, failing that, sexual fodder -- for the colonizers. Brink's protagonist, Hanna X., an abused orphan from Bremen, is eager for the imagined romance of the desert, but life in the colonies turns out to be even worse than what she has known before. After she is raped and disfigured by a German officer, Hanna turns to murder, assembling a "sad menagerie" of other downtrodden people in a crusade of vigilante vengeance. Brink's powerful and brutal story is an effective response to those who suspected that the end of apartheid would leave him without a subject, and a shrewd meditation on the dehumanizing power of hatred.

Publishers Weekly

Acclaimed South African novelist Brink (The Rights of Desire; Devil's Valley; etc.) paints a harrowing picture of German South-West Africa (modern-day Namibia) in his latest novel, focusing on a German initiative to import hundreds of women to Africa for the colonists at the turn of the last century. Hanna X is an orphan who spends her early years in Germany trying to catch on as a domestic with a number of families, only to have the sexual advances of various libidinous husbands ruin her efforts to find a stable situation. Hanna thinks she has escaped the world of male domination when she receives permission to emigrate to South Africa, but her escape backfires. Raped and mutilated by brutal German officer Hauptmann Buhlke, she is taken to a horrific outpost known as the Frauenstein, where the abuse continues. The book's surreal, fragmentary first half, in which the events of Hanna's childhood are interspersed with the harrowing details of her arrival in Africa, is followed by a riveting second half, in which Hanna escapes the Frauenstein and tracks down Buhlke with the help of another abused woman, Katja, and a Herero tribesman, Kahapa, whom the two women rescue from a savage German farmer. The trio quickly become a small vigilante posse as they journey to Windhoek to find Buhlke, and their efforts to turn the tables on the Germans succeed when they murder a small troop of soldiers and then wipe out a larger group at a garrison. The relentless violence occasionally turns Hanna into a one-dimensional character, but the imagery from this haunting novel will stay with readers, as will the frightening allure of all-consuming hatred: "So beautiful. So singular. So utterly pure. So abundantly full of life." (June) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

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