Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

I'm often amazed how an ending can make or break a book. I felt sort of lukewarm about Cutting for Stone for most of the read read (and it's a longish read), and as the book rolled around to the climax I still wasn't certain. But the very last chapter, the denouement (thank you 8th grad English!), really did it for me, and left me with a good, happy, satisfied feeling about the entire novel.

The novel centers on a medical clinic in Addis Ababa, which is located in Ethiopia, if you did not know this (and I'm a little embarrassed to say that I could not have told you this fact before reading the book). It begins in the 1950s, with a back story that stretches back a little further, and spans a few decades to end in the 1980s. The narrator, Marion, is one of two twin boys born to a nun who worked in the small hospital, who no one knew was pregnant until she went into labor, dying and leaving the boys to be raised by their adoptive parents, Ghosh and Hema, who are also physicians at the clinic.

The story follows Marion from his childhood with his brother Shiva, to his young adulthood as a doctor in New York, but while it might be considered a coming of age story, the story centers just as much on his parents, both his birth parents (largely absent from the narrative but important nonetheless) and his adoptive parents. In fact, even though they don't even enter the narrative until several chapters in, it is Hema and Ghosh who hold the family, the clinic, and the novel together.

The organization of the novel is interesting. A full third of the novel is devoted to the day the twins are born (although interspersed with backstory), and then the remaining two-thirds of the novel covers several decades. I thought this should feel imbalanced, and yet that first day set everything into place and the telling of the story felt absolutely necessary. Even so, my interest in the novel ebbed and flowed as I read. I was drawn in by the story of the twins' birth, but felt my interest wane at times as the story progressed beyond into the subsequent years. There were times that I felt I couldn't relate well to the narrator. There were times that the medical details were more technical than they needed to be (Verghese himself is a physician, and can be forgiven for wanting to teach his trade). There were even a few times that the story felt tedious. But there were also times when I was drawn in, or when the characters felt particularly compelling, and I found the historical details about Ethiopia in the 50's and 60's and 70's to be really interesting. I know so little about that part of the world.

So in the end, particularly after the final chapter, I didn't begrudge the 600+ pages (and it was on my Kindle, so I actually didn't even know I'd read 600+ pages until after I finished). I don't know if I would recommend it or not, but I liked it well enough that if you were inclined to read it in the first place, I'd say go ahead.