Darkness Calls the Tiger

Set in Burma—present-day Myanmar—during World War II, this expansive, fascinating novel for adults begins with a dynamite first chapter that catapults readers into a narrative zinging with danger and unpredictability. It grapples with compelling questions about God’s presence in the face of suffering, evil, war, and death.

When amber-eyed Kailyn Moran, the daughter of American missionaries to the Kachin mountain people of Burma, was 9 years old, events beyond her control converged her identity with a dark Kachin legend about a tiger man named Sharaw.

Now Kai—as she is known to her family and community—is 18 years old. Her mother died years ago, and John Moran, Kai’s father, is no longer the loving parent he used to be. Angry and bitter, John treats Kai harshly, and inadvertently his unloving actions give birth in Kai a sense of God’s fierce anger and lack of compassion and love. Though Kai used to feel she had a home, a place to belong and thrive, now she feels unmoored. Yet she has no idea of the darkness and sense of homelessness that will soon be her physical and spiritual battlefield.

After Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, its army invades southern Burma. As rumors of war accelerate and become a reality, floods of refugees flee north to the village where Kai lives. John Moran, despite his daughter’s protests, decides to leave Kai and a new missionary named Ryan McDonough in charge.

Kai’s sense of abandonment is cemented as war comes to the village in a brutal onslaught, forcing Kai and Ryan to witness evil they could never have imagined.

As Kai and Ryan each find their way, sometimes alone, sometimes together, they forge a friendship, a fragile trust—shattered again and again, then patched together—till Kai learns that she has a choice, like all people who are deeply wounded by war and calamity, a choice between anger or trust, revenge or love. And Ryan finally begins to understand that trying to be in control of one’s life is a myth, a futile grasping for security that will always disappoint.

Darkness Calls the Tiger is a must-read that exposes historical injustices, offers captivating characters and a riveting plot, addresses spiritual questions posed by people who long to understand where God is when darkness descends, and portrays Christian hope.

(Kregel)