Author Description

"A fascinating exploration of the changing face of social customs and gender politics." - Kirkus Reviews Nansamba is married off aged sixteen to young Ggalabuzi from a neighboring village. It is an arranged marriage in 1940s rural Uganda and she works hard to build a prosperous household together with her easy-going and hardworking husband. Twelve years into the marriage, Ggalabuzi exercises his male right to enter into a second marriage without telling his wife; and does so with her younger sister Mucwa. Nansamba navigates this hazardous marital and familial road with extraordinary wisdom, courage and dignity. At twenty-eight, educated, city-born Biiti is considered an old maid. Her anxious relatives find her a rural husband past his prime and with a secret history. He soon destroys their marriage and she abandons it to become a successful businesswoman and anchor of her family. For a quarter of a century relatives, friends and in-laws from Nansamba and Biiti's families crisscross each other's lives and create much drama and many children, including four sets of twins.