Praise
Scholastique Mukasonga is not only one of the most important Francophone novelists writing today but a storyteller of rare gifts, and Sister Deborah, expertly translated by Mark Polizzotti confirms this. Trenchant in its critique of the nexus between colonialism and religion, compelling in its feminist and decolonial perspective, it marks another gift by Mukasonga for English-language readers.
— John Keene
The narrators of Sister Deborah turn and tilt story like a prism until, by Mukasonga’s light, the versions and legends, tellings and retellings become many tiny brilliant rainbows.
— Ama Codjoe
Award-winning French Rwandan novelist Mukasonga evokes her country’s tumultuous history in a lyrical, allegorical narrative, translated by Polizzotti, set in the 1930s, when white Catholic missionaries proselytized to a population already steeped in myths . . . A haunting tale.
— Kirkus Reviews
[Sister Deborah] delivers a dazzling and witty narrative of a Black Christian cult in early 20th-century Rwanda . . . as in Mukasonga's excellent previous work, she manages to balance clear-eyed portrayals of charlatan leaders and their superstitious followers with striking depictions of spiritual visions . . . a master class in post-colonial feminist storytelling.
— Publishers Weekly
Female fury and the power of women are realized in Sister Deborah's prophecy of Mother Africa’s reign, bringing satisfaction and ultimately nullifying the promises of missionaries and colonizers.
— Kelly Fojtik, Booklist
Structurally, Sister Deborah is a fascinating book, with Mukasonga hinting that we’re getting a kind of coming-of-age novel early on and then shifting gears into a very different mode. The overall effect is polyphonic, as the narrative details a series of religious conflicts over the years, contrasting the attitudes and beliefs of several characters from Rwanda and the US.
— Tobias Carroll, Words Without Borders
This is a brilliant novel and Mukasonga tells a first-class story.
— The Modern Novel
Mukasonga’s writing is as striking for the bracing clarity and directness of her sentences as for the restlessness of its experimentations with genre . . . Sister Deborah presses on questions of cultural translation, which are also Mukasonga’s own: questions of faith and syncretism but also of faithfulness to one’s origins . . . The paths lives take, Sister Deborah insists, are mysterious and unstable. And it would be disingenuous to claim that we do not yearn to explain these mysteries to ourselves, to mold these accidents and contingencies into narratives that make sense to us.
— Marta Figlerowicz, The Paris Review
By exposing how even progressive interpretations of the faith can uphold patriarchal norms, Mukasonga invites her reader to question the limitations imposed on marginalized believers. In Sister Deborah, real liberation lies in eschewing conformity to any dogma, even the Bible. But the novel is more than a critique of religious institutions: It is a call to redefine faith, perhaps even radically, on one’s own terms.
— Tope Folarin, The Atlantic
This remarkable, recursive book about the power of belief — like its heroines — finds new form again and again.
— V.V. Ganeshananthan, The New York Times
At times howlingly funny, Sister Deborah pokes fun at European colonialist powers and at the same time exposes the tragedy of occupation. Mukasonga draws on Rwanda’s rich folk traditions without minimizing the injustices entrenched in its autochthonous culture.
— Bárbara Mujica, Washington Independent Review of Books
Sister Deborah’s greatest strength is in the layers of interpretation and unreliability that the narrators deliver . . . Sister Deborah’s story, as told to Ikirezi, walks through competing influences of Rwandan tradition and colonial religion, and stacks dreams, delirium, visions, and reality upon each other.
— Allison Zhao, Acta Victoriana
Incredibly impactful. If you have not read anything by Mukasonga, you should, and Sister Deborah is a good place to start.
— The Mookse and the Gripes
[Mukasonga] sharply and profoundly explores the spiritual realm in Sister Deborah . . . Ikirezi and Sister Deborah's trajectories––Africa to America for the former; America to Africa for the latter––are superbly engaging stories, while their experiences also adroitly (never didactically) expose widespread disparities and inequities of race, gender, history, society, and religion. Mukasonga skillfully elevates her storytelling into enriched enlightenment.
— Terry Hong, Shelf Awareness
A brilliant serio-comic fable, a critique of religious delusions and how they feed self-destructive fantasies . . . an amusingly wild yarn.
— Bill Marx, The Arts Fuse
