Haben Girma, the first deaf blind woman to graduate from Harvard law school, debut her first book entitled ‘The Deaf Blind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law’ It is set to be released on August.
Raised by two Eritrean refugee parents who survived a 30-year war, Haben learned to value courage and community early in life. She advocates for equal opportunities for people with disabilities. President Obama named her a White House Champion of Change. She received the Helen Keller Achievement Award, and a spot on the Forbes 30 under 30 lists. President Bill Clinton, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and Chancellor Angela Merkel have all honored Haben. Her work has been featured in the Financial Times, BBC, Washington Post, NPR, and more.
About her book Haben recently tweeted “My new book received a starred review from Publishers Weekly: “This is a heartwarming memoir of a woman who champions access and dignity for all.”
The book tells her incredible life story and how she managed to make it overcoming the challenges people with disability face and how innovation helps her through. Haben believes disability is an opportunity for innovation. We can build a stronger community and better world using digital innovations and create access to all to allow them bring the best out of themselves,” She quoted
In her lifetime or so far, she has crisscrossed the globe, mastered non-visual techniques for navigating both salsa and the electric saw, climbed an iceberg and faced a bull, and attained the prestigious degree that helps her advocate for increased access and equity for disabled persons. She does this all, joyfully, using innovations that allow her to move readily through abled spaces as a deaf and blind woman.
In August, she visits with award winning journalist Angie Coiro to share her life story.
Her incredible life journey is an inspiration for people with disability and the whole world.
Another book to be released this summer is a Novel ‘The Shadow King’ by Maaza Mengeste. Maaza Mengiste is known by readers by her ‘Beneath the Lion’s Gaze’ a novel which was loved by many around the world.
Beneath the lion’s gaze is set in Addis Ababa in 1974, at the end of the rule of Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie and the beginning of the military junta replacing Selassie’s rule, the Derg. It follows the family of a doctor, his dying wife and their two sons through the political upheaval. The guardian’s writer Aida Edemariam hailed the novel as ‘a book anchored to the body, vivid with smells and fears and violations. The award-winning Beneath the Lion’s Gaze, was also selected by The Guardian as one of the 10 best contemporary African books. It has been translated into several languages and appeared on numerous“Best of” lists.
Maaza Mengiste is an Ethiopian-American writer and novelist. She was born in Addis Ababa and lived in Nigeria and Kenya before settled in America.
Also, her new novel is a gripping novel set during Mussolini’s 1935 invasion of Ethiopia the Shadow King takes us back to the first real conflict of World War II, casting light on the women soldiers who were left out of the historical record.
According to review and summary by bookstore.com, on her new novel Maaza also breaks new ground in this evocative, mesmerizing account of the role of women during wartime not just as caregivers, but as bold warriors defending their country. With the threat of Mussolini’s army looming, recently orphaned Hirut struggles to adapt to her new life as a maid in Kidane and his wife Aster’s household. Kidane, an officer in Emperor Haile Selassie’s army, rushes to mobilize his strongest men before the Italians invade.
The book tells a story of Hirut a servant girl. Her trajectory to becoming a fierce soldier defending her country is the nexus of the story. The author elucidates the landscape of war by focusing on individuals offering the viewpoints among others of Carlo Fucelli, a sadistic colonel in Mussolini’s army; Ettore Navarra, a Jewish Venetian photographer/ soldier tasked with documenting war atrocities; and Haile Selassie, the emperor bearing the weight of his country’s devastation at the hand of the Italians.
In Hirut, Maaza depicts both a servant girl’s low status and the ferocity of her spirit inspired by the author’s great-grandmother who sued her father for his gun so she could enlist in the Ethiopian army which allows her to survive betrayal by the married couple she serves and her eventual imprisonment by Fucelli, captured with horrifying detail by Navarra’s camera.
As the war begins in earnest, Hirut, Aster, and the other women long to do more than care for the wounded and bury the dead. When Emperor Haile Selassie goes into exile and Ethiopia quickly loses hope, it is Hirut who offers a plan to maintain morale. She helps disguise a gentle peasant as the emperor and soon becomes his guard, inspiring other women to take up arms against the Italians.
“What follows is a gorgeously crafted and unput down able exploration of female power, with Hirut as the fierce, original, and brilliant voice at its heart. In incandescent, lyrical prose, Maaza Mengiste breathes life into complicated characters on both sides of the battle line, shaping a heartrending, indelible exploration of what it means to be a woman at war,” quoted from the review, enjoy !
The Ethiopian Herald Sunday Edition 28 July 2019
BY FASICA BERHANE
