To Asmara
To Asmara is a novel by Thomas Keneally about an Australian reporter named Darcy who travels to famine-ridden Ethiopia during the Eritrean struggle for independence. Along with a young woman searching for her father, an expelled aid worker, and an English woman hoping to end female genital mutilation, Darcy crosses into Eritrea seeking the truth about the war. What he discovers forces him to reevaluate his Western ideals and his view of humanity. Based on the author’s firsthand experiences in Africa, the story confronts issues of violence, poverty, politics, cultural differences, and love in a war-torn land ignored by the West. Critics praised the book as suspenseful, eloquent, ambitious, and engrossing.