The Lizard Cage

Beautifully written and taking us into an exotic land, Karen Connellys debut novel The Lizard Cage is a celebration of the resilience of the human spirit.

Teza once electrified the people of Burma with his protest songs against the dictatorship. Arrested by the Burmese secret police in the days of mass protest, he is seven years into a twenty-year sentence in solitary confinement. Cut off from his family and contact with other prisoners, he applies his acute intelligence, Buddhist patience, and humor to find meaning in the interminable days, and searches for news in every being and object that is grudgingly allowed into his cell.

Despite his isolation, Teza has a profound influence on the people around him. His very existence challenges the brutal authority of the jailers, and his steadfast spirit inspires radical change. Even when Tezas criminal server tries to compromise the singer for his own gain, Teza befriends him and risks falling into the trap of forbidden conversation, food, and the most dangerous contraband of all: paper and pen.

Yet, it is through Tezas relationship with Little Brother, a twelve-year-old orphan whos grown up inside the walls, that we ultimately come to understand the importance of hope and human connection in the midst of injustice and violence. Teza and the boy are prisoners of different orders: only one of them dreams of escape and only one of them will achieve ittheir extraordinary friendship frees both of them in utterly surprising ways.

lived for almost two years on the Thai-Burma border, among Burmese exiles and dissidents, many whose stories on which The Lizard Cage draws. She won the Governor Generals Award for Nonfiction for Touch the Dragon, A Thai Journal, published in the United States as Dream of a Thousand Lives, a New York Times Notable Travel Book. The Lizard Cage is her first novel and was a finalist for the 2006 Kiriyama Prize for Fiction.