Leila: The Weighted Silence of Memory

by Heather Neff

Twelve year old Leila knows little more of the world than the view from her family’s mud-brick hut on the steep slopes of the Atlas Mountains. Her greatest hope is to marry the son of the village shopkeeper and to live like all the women who came before her. Leila’s dreams are destroyed in one night when three strangers take her in payment for her father’s debts. Thus begins her long journey into the silence of a child sold to a brothel in a distant city. The silence of a young woman passed on to a judge who exploits her as his servant. The silence of a barely literate woman who suffers years of rape, beatings and hunger. Leila survives by clinging to memories of her mountain village and the love of her mother. When she meets two sisters determined to improve women’s lives she gains her first glimmering of hope ⎯ and the courage to take her freedom. After a harrowing escape she slowly reclaims her life through the love of a family facing their own search for healing.

Genres: Fiction

356 pages, Paperback

First published July 27, 2009

Reviews

[Heather Jaynes]

This book is so heartbreaking and yet so fulfilling once finished. Leila is a truly inspiring character and you find yourself loving her so much you just want to care for her. The author did a great job with this story, one of my new favorites. I can’t wait to read the second one!

[Michelle Peet]

This is one of the few books in recent history that made me refuse to go to sleep...even when thoroughly exhausted. Granted, this level of engagement didn't happen until I was quite a ways in, but still, it's great to be trapped in the pages of a book again. Read this!

[PintaGuh]

Wow. Just wow, I'm so lucky to have her as a teacher and really get to pick her brain about the book. I'm super excited about the sequel!!

[sr]

Lots of typos, gruesome scenes of rape. Do not read if you don't want to have a stomach ache.