Dolores K. (deedeeann) reviewed on 10/18/2011 + 4 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

This book is heartbreaking, uplifting and uproariously funny. It's the story of a unique childhood, miraculously survived and beautifully described.

Alexandra Fuller, the "Bobo" of the story looks back on her childhood with equal parts fond humor and honesty in a voice that is almost detached.

You just fall in love with the whole family, her very "Pukka" parents-Mum, a second-generation Kenyan, and Dad, a fisherman and farmer at heart, the babies, Adrian, Olivia and "Robert" and her older sister Van (Vanessa), who despite being relentlessy read Shakespeare in-utero, steadfastly declines to read or write, which is a shame, because her version of the same childhood from her point of view would be priceless.

This is a childhood that begins idyllically in Rhodesia and treks through Africa as the family seeks to escape turmoil and revolutions as Central Africa painfully throws off its Colonial yoke. Each time they start hopefully anew and set down roots and farm with their beloved collection of horses and dogs.

Throughout the droughts, the wars, the tight finances and heartbreaking tragedies the Fullers never give up and never lose their love for each other and Africa.

Fuller tells her story in small sparkling vignettes. Her descriptions of the sights, sounds and smells of Africa are intoxicatingly evocative. The stories of her childhood are woven together with love, nostalgia, humor and a touch of regret.

Van claims to have never read it, and Mum refers to it Dramatically as "That Awful Book!", but I loved it.

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