For someone who has written so graphically about the violence of war in the country of her birth, Maaza Mengiste has a surprisingly peaceful air about her. She smiles serenely as I stress about why my dictaphone isn’t working properly as the single hour I have booked for my interview ticks down, and says: ‘It’s fine, just take your time, I’ve learned not to hurry things.’
This is certainly true: her first novel, Beneath the Lion’s Gaze, was published a decade ago. Set in Addis Ababa on the brink of the 1974 revolution, the story centres on the lives of a doctor and his sons. Thanks to Mengiste’s meticulous research of historical records, news reports and personal accounts, her fictional characters are a metaphor for the turmoil of war and revolution. The critics loved it and fans waited eagerly for her next offering. Then, they waited some more… Ten years on, and the writer has only now published her second novel. I ask what took her so long.
