Acts of Faith

This story is set in Sudan among rebel leaders in a war-torn country with hardened guerillas, idealistic aid workers, evangelical young women, and a pilot responsible for bringing aid and people in and out of the area. I was quickly drawn into this complex world through the varied voices and life experiences of the characters, especially as an unlikely and tragic romance emerges.

History, politics, and the human heart are all in play. As a reader I struggled along with the characters as the narrative took on fraught moments of international intrigue and probed the hearts and emotions of the… show more.

Philip Caputo made his name—and won a Pulitzer—for a memoir of the Vietnam War. Acts of Faith is a novel but is equally searing: an indictment of adrenaline-driven aid junkies, missionaries, and uncritical western politicians who connived in the 1990s with African warlords to create what would become South Sudan. I turned the pages of this book with a growing sense of familiarity. Many of Caputo’s characters—the soldiers, the bush pilots, the priests—are based on real people that I knew. But you don’t need to know the history to find this a compelling read.