This book analyses how the idea – or the problem - of belonging is articulated in a range of contemporary francophone Mauritian novels. Waters explores how forms of affective belonging intersect with the exclusionary ‘politics of belonging’ in novels by Nathacha Appanah, Ananda Devi, Shenaz Patel, Bertrand de Robillard, Amal Sewtohul and Carl de Souza.

With brutal honesty and poetic urgency, Ananda Devi relates the tale of four young Mauritians trapped in their country's endless cycle of fear and violence. Eve out of Her Ruins is a heartbreaking look at the Mauritius tourists don't see, and an exploration of the construction of personhood at the margins of society.

Speaking of Mauritius as an economic miracle has become a cliché, and with good reason: Its development since Independence in 1968 can easily be narrated as a rags-to-riches story. In addition, it is a stable democracy capable of containing the conflict potential inherent in its complex ethnic and religious demography. This book brings together some of the finest scholarship, domestic as well as foreign, on contemporary Mauritius, offering perspectives from constitutional law, cultural studies, sociology, archaeology, economics, social anthropology and more. While celebrating the indisputable, and impressive, achievements of the Mauritian nation on its fiftieth birthday, this book is far from toothless. Looking back inevitably implies looking ahead, and in order to do so, critical self-scrutiny is essential, to be able to learn from the mistakes of the past. The contributors raise fundamental questions concerning a broad range of issues, from the dilemmas of multiculturalism to the marginal role of women in public life, from the question of constitutional reform and the continued problem of corruption to the slow destruction of Mauritius’ joy and pride, namely the beauty and purity of its natural scenery. Taking stock of the first fifty years, this book also looks ahead to the next fifty years, giving some cues as to where Mauritius can and should aim in the next decades.

Based on a true, still-unfolding story, Silence of the Chagos is a powerful exploration of cultural identity, the concept of home, and above all the neverending desire for justice. Shenaz Patel draws on the lives of exiled Chagossians in this tragic example of 20th century political oppression. Every afternoon a woman in a red headscarf walks to the end of the quay and looks out over the water, fixing her gaze “back there”: to Diego Garcia, one of the small islands forming the Chagos archipelago in the Indian Ocean. With no explanation, no forewarning, and only an hour to pack their belongings, the Chagossians are deported to Mauritius. Officials tell her that the island is “closed”— there is no going back for any of them. Charlesia longs for life on Diego Garcia, where the days were spent working on a coconut plantation; the nights dancing to sega music. As she struggles to come to terms with her new reality, Charlesia crosses paths with Désiré, a young man born on the one-way journey to Mauritius. Désiré has never set foot on Diego Garcia, but as Charlesia unfolds the dramatic story of his people, he learns of the home he never knew and the disrupted future of his people. With the sovereignty of Chagos currently being debated on an international judiciary level, Silence of the Chagos is an important and timely examination of the rights of individuals in the face of governmental corruption. Praise for Silence of the Chagos: “Some twenty years ago, I was struck by a photo showing barefoot women on the road facing the armed police. They were Chagossian women protesting in Mauritius with astonishing determination.” This photo, which she's never forgotten, is the inspiration for the Mauritian novelist and journalist Shenaz Patel's third book. Mingling various voice, Patel describes, in a bitter, clear-cut style, the tragedy of the inhabitants of the Chagos, those coral islands of the Indian Ocean that were turned into an American military base and whose inhabitants had been banished to Mauritius between 1967 and 1972. With a prose that seeps and stings, and a sharp sensibility, Shenaz Patel breathes life into the painful nostalgia, the lingering memories, and the eternal incomprehension of these expelled from a string of lost islands.” —Le Monde “This novel has two voices, those of Charlesia and Désiré, both of whom are foreigners, natives of the Chagos archipelago, living in exile in Mauritius, an island that is a paradise for some but a hell for them. The Chagos are an archipelago that would have been hidden in the depths of the Indian Ocean, had Americans not built a military base to bombard other countries. Charlesia and Désiré live and breathe; the Mauritian writer Shenaz Patel introduces us to them and gives them voice again.” —Libération “From scenes of daily life to the horrors of forced exile, through the grief of deculturation and the experience of an impossible identity, Patel interrogates the relationship between political expediency and its all-too-human consequences, between the abstract needs of international security and the concrete needs of the individual, and above all between the rich and the poor.” —L'Express

Stephen Maturin brings Captain Jack Aubrey secret orders to lead an expedition against the French islands of Mauritius and La Reunion, but the conduct of two of his own officers threatens the success of the mission.

In The Last Brother by Nathacha Appanah, 1944 is coming to a close and nine-year-old Raj is unaware of the war devastating the rest of the world. He lives in Mauritius, a remote island in the Indian Ocean, where survival is a daily struggle for his family. When a brutal beating lands Raj in the hospital of the prison camp where his father is a guard, he meets a mysterious boy his own age. David is a refugee, one of a group of Jewish exiles whose harrowing journey took them from Nazi occupied Europe to Palestine, where they were refused entry and sent on to indefinite detainment in Mauritius. A massive storm on the island leads to a breach of security at the camp, and David escapes, with Raj's help. After a few days spent hiding from Raj's cruel father, the two young boys flee into the forest. Danger, hunger, and malaria turn what at first seems like an adventure to Raj into an increasingly desperate mission. This unforgettable and deeply moving novel sheds light on a fascinating and unexplored corner of World War II history, and establishes Nathacha Appanah as a significant international voice.

ONE OF NPR'S BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • A sweeping debut novel that explores the intimate struggle for independence and success of a young descendant of Indian indentured laborers in Mauritius, a small multiracial island in the Indian Ocean. "The beauty of Busjeet's splendid, often breathtaking book is, like the best stories of journeys to young adulthood, the precious and well-observed and heartbreaking details of day-to-day life." --Edward P. Jones, Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Known World In the 1950s, Vishnu Bhushan is a young boy yet to learn the truth beyond the rumors of his family's fractured histories--an alliance, as his mother says, of two bankrupt families. In evocative chapters, the first two decades of Vishnu's life in Mauritius unfolds with heart wrenching closeness as he battles to experience the world beyond, and the cultural, political, and familial turmoil that hold on to him. Through gorgeous and precise language, Silent Winds, Dry Seas conjures the spirit and rich life of Mauritius, even as its diverse peoples live under colonial rule. Weaving the soaring hopes, fierce love, and heart-breaking tragedies of Vishnu's proud Mauritian family together with his country's turbulent path to gain independence, Busjeet masterfully evokes the epic sweep of history in the intimate moments of a boy's life. Silent Winds, Dry Seas is a poetic, powerful, and universal novel of identity and place, of the legacies of colonialism, of tradition, modernity, and emigration, and of what a family will sacrifice for its children to thrive.