Wendy Catran: Not raining today

By MARGIE THOMSON

In the wake of the Dalai Lama's visit to New Zealand there will be many children wanting to understand more about that mysterious place he comes from - Tibet.

This novel will be a great help, not just in that it gives a picture of the physical landscape of the country, and especially its capital Lhasa, but that it gets right inside the mental framework - the feelings, aspirations, spirituality - of its people.

Lhamo and Dolma are two 13-year-old Buddhist nuns living in Lhasa amid the destruction and fear wrought by the Chinese invasion of their country. When their friend and mentor is arrested during a stone-throwing incident they decide to take some low-key direct action themselves, not so much against the Chinese as in favour of their own forbidden leader, the Dalai Lama, but they are seen and so must flee the country to Nepal. So their tragic adventure begins.

Catran is a sensitive storyteller, and with this, her first book, she demonstrates the power of an individual story to convey a much wider story, of the destruction of one culture by another. One also senses, through her depiction of the simple, materially uncluttered lives of these girls, that not only China but the whole, materialistic world is setting a trap that they will scarcely be able to avoid.

Part of the proceeds from sales of this book will go to Tibetan nuns in exile at Khachoe Ghakyil Ling Nunnery, Kathmandu, Nepal.

Lothian

$15.95