# Beneath the Lion's Gaze

by Maaza Mengiste, Ethiopia, 2010

An epic tale of a father and two sons, of betrayals and loyalties, of a family unraveling in the wake of Ethiopia’s revolution.

This memorable, heartbreaking story opens in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 1974, on the eve of a revolution. Yonas kneels in his mother’s prayer room, pleading to his god for an end to the violence that has wracked his family and country. His father, Hailu, a prominent doctor, has been ordered to report to jail after helping a victim of state-sanctioned torture to die. And Dawit, Hailu’s youngest son, has joined an underground resistance movement, a choice that will lead to more upheaval and bloodshed across a ravaged Ethiopia.

*Beneath the Lion’s Gaze* tells a gripping story of family, of the bonds of love and friendship set in a time and place that has rarely been explored in fiction. It is a story about the lengths human beings will go in pursuit of freedom and the human price of a national revolution. Emotionally gripping, poetic, and indelibly tragic, *Beneath The Lion’s Gaze* is a transcendent and powerful debut.

ISBN: 9780224089159

## See also

- [Maaza Mengiste](https://africantales.net/authors/maaza-mengiste)
- [More from Ethiopia](https://africantales.net/countries/ETH)
- [Historical Fiction](https://africantales.net/genres/historical-fiction)
- [The 2010s](https://africantales.net/decades/2010s)

Source: https://africantales.net/books/beneath-the-lion-s-gaze