Product Description
A Sin of Omission
Author: Marguerite Poland
Format: Paperback
Sunday Times Literary Award for Fiction 2021
Winner of the 2021 Sunday Times Fiction Prize
In the Eastern Cape, Stephen (Malusi) Mzamane, a young Anglican priest, must journey to his mother’s rural home to inform her of his elder brother’s death.
First educated at the Native College in Grahamstown, Stephen was sent to England in 1869 for training at the Missionary College in Canterbury. But on his return to South Africa, relegated to a dilapidated mission near Fort Beaufort, he had to confront not only the prejudices of a colonial society but the discrimination within the Church itself.
Conflicted between his loyalties to the amaNgqika people, for whom his brother fought, and the colonial cause he as Reverend Mzamane is expected to uphold, Stephen’s journey to his mother’s home proves decisive in resolving the contradictions that tear at his heart.
About the Author
Marguerite Poland is the author of six novels, including Train to Dorinbult, Shades, Iron Love and Recessional for Grace. In 2003, in collaboration with artist Leigh Voigt and Professor David Hammond-Tooke, Marguerite Poland wrote the highly acclaimed The Abundant Herds: a Celebration of the Nguni Cattle of the Zulu People, based on her doctoral thesis. She is the winner of the first two Sir Percy Fitzpatrick Awards for Children's Literature and is the recipient of two Lifetime Achievement Awards for English Literature. Grahamstown,
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