War close to home

The devil's tears / Steven Horne. Sydney: Macmillan Australia, 2010


The Devil's tears is a gripping novel, which takes the reader right into the heart of East Timor; firstly at the time of the Indonesian invasion in 1975, and then some 22 years later. In 1975, when bloody war raveages his beloved Portuguese Timor, Cesar da Silva flees with his wife and children from a country in flames. Becoming separated from his young family and believing they are dead, Cesar finds passage to Portugal and later Australia. In occupied Timor, Cesar's wife is alive, but her troubles are far from over.
In 1997, more than 20 years later, a young Australian journalist and her photographer are drawn to the killing fields of Timor. Compelled to expose the truth of the terrible suffering of the Timorese people at the hands of the invaders to the world, they become entangled in the da Silva family tragedy.
Through the telling of these two intertwining personal stories the book gives great insight into what happened during the 24 year occupation, when around 100,000 people died from fighting, disease and starvation...