Cry, the Beloved Country
Recommended. Age: 16+. A Catholic review of this book for parents.
Our review
An old priest in South Africa goes to the big city to look for his son. He finds that his son has done something terrible. Two fathers who should be enemies learn to forgive and help each other. This is a sorrowful and beautiful book about sin, forgiveness and a broken country. The priest prays, suffers and keeps faith. The father of the murdered man answers with mercy. Good Books for Catholic Kids places it at sixteen and up because of violence and despair. It includes a killing, a death sentence, prostitution and a pregnancy outside marriage, none reported as explicit.
For parents
Read aloud from about fifteen. Independent reading from sixteen, where Good Books for Catholic Kids places it. Know before you hand it over: a man is murdered, a young man is hanged for it, a sister has become a prostitute, a teenage girl is pregnant and unmarried, and the mood is heavy. The priest is Anglican, so explain how Anglican and Catholic priesthood differ. Ask: what does James Jarvis do with his grief, and why? How does Kumalo answer his son's sin without excusing it? What does the book say fear does to a country? Where is there hope at the end?