Please join us on Thursday, October 6th at 10:00 am in the first floor meeting rooms for our book discussion of Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese was one of the best books I read when it came out in 2009. Now that we are going to have it for this month’s book discussion group, I get to enjoy it all over again. Verghese draws richly dramatic characters with Ethiopia having its own personality throughout the book. Multiple dynamics keep you on the edge of your seat, such as brotherly love, betrayal, illicit love affairs and even a shipboard drama, along with medical breakthroughs. But it all begins with the story of twins.

Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a nun, Sister Mary Joseph Praise, and a renowned surgeon, Thomas Stone. The sister dies during childbirth and the father becomes so overwhelmed with grief that he abandons his twin sons to the Missing Hospital staff where they are born. Missing Hospital is located in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Both brothers grow up during the upheaval of Ethiopia’s revolution and become medical doctors. Marion eventually has to abandon a life in Ethiopia for one in New York City, bringing him closer to his elusive but famous surgeon father. The drama that drives Marion from Ethiopia involves a woman with whom both brothers are involved. What originally tore the brothers apart eventually, and strangely, brings them together as their fates are forever intertwined.

-SH