House of Stone: The True Story of a Family Divided In WarTorn Z

HOUSE OF STONE is based on a remarkable series of interviews with a white farmer and black nanny, set against the backdrop of the last of Britain's colonies in Africa to become independent, and the descent into madness of one of Africa's most respected nationalist leaders. "...One bright morning, Nigel Hough, one of the few remaining white farmers, received the news he had been dreading. There was a crowd of war veterans at his gates demanding he hand over his homestead. When he returned, the mob started a fire and dragged him to an outhouse. To his shock, the leader of the invaders was the family's much-loved, nanny Aqui. "Get out or we'll kill you," she spat. "There is no place for whites in our country." Christina Lamb uncovered the astonishing human saga told in HOUSE OF STONE while traveling back and forth to report clandestinely on Zimbabwe. Her powerful narrative traces the history of the brutal Rhodesia civil war, independence, the hope then despair of the Mugabe years, through the lives of two people she met who find themselves on opposing sides. Although born within a few miles of each other, their experience growing up could not have been more different. While Nigel played cricket for his country and piloted his own plane under Victoria Falls Bridge, Aqui grew up in a mud-and-dpole hut, sleeping on the floor with her brothers and sisters. "They had cars and went shopping in South Africa. We didn't have food and had to walk an hour each day to fetch water," she remembers.