The Wind Whistling in the Cranes

A Novel

By: Lídia Jorge, Margaret Jull Costa - translator, Annie McDermott - translator

Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell

This breathtaking saga, set in the 1990s, tells the story of the landlords and tenants of a derelict canning factory in Southern Portugal. The wealthy, always-scheming Leandros have owned the building since before the Carnation Revolution, a peaceful coup that toppled a four-decade-long dictatorship and led to Portugal's withdrawal from its African colonies. It was Leandro matriarch Dona Regina who handed the keys to the Matas, the bustling family from Cape Verde who saw past the dusty machinery and converted the space into a warm - and welcoming - home.

When Dona Regina is found dead outside the factory on a holiday weekend, her granddaughter, Milene, investigates. Aware that her aunts and uncles, who are off on vacation, will berate her inability to articulate what has just happened, she approaches the factory riddled with anxiety. Hours later, the Matas return home to find this strange girl hiding behind their clotheslines, and with caution, they take her in...

Days later, the Leandros realize that Milene has become hopelessly entangled with their tenants, and their fear of political and financial ruin sets off a series of events that threatens to uproot the lives of everyone involved.

©2002 Lidia Jorge and Publicações Dom Quixote. By arrangement with Literarische Agentur Mertin Inh. Nicole Witt e. K., Frankfurt am Main, Germany (P)2022 Tantor

Long but lovely

A long and lovely story that explores themes of race and immigration and women’s right and disability with heart wrenching tenderness. Enjoy the reading in the moment and don’t wait to see how it all ends

Unique, spellbinding story

This book about two intertwined families of different classes and races in Portugal is amazing in its delicacy and poetry. It is also remarkable in its delicate treatment of a cognitively impaired yet lovely woman, developmentally delayed since birth. The story is told largely from her viewpoint, which is poignant in it vulnerability and intuition. This book should be on Oprah’s list!