The Last Resort A Memoir Of Zimbabwe

Author : Douglas Rogers
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0307459845
Total Pages : 322 pages
Book Rating : 4.48/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Last Resort written by Douglas Rogers and published by Crown. This book was released on 2009-09-22 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thrilling, heartbreaking, and, at times, absurdly funny, The Last Resort is a remarkable true story about one family in a country under siege and a testament to the love, perseverance, and resilience of the human spirit. Born and raised in Zimbabwe, Douglas Rogers is the son of white farmers living through that country’s long and tense transition from postcolonial rule. He escaped the dull future mapped out for him by his parents for one of adventure and excitement in Europe and the United States. But when Zimbabwe’s president Robert Mugabe launched his violent program to reclaim white-owned land and Rogers’s parents were caught in the cross fire, everything changed. Lyn and Ros, the owners of Drifters–a famous game farm and backpacker lodge in the eastern mountains that was one of the most popular budget resorts in the country–found their home and resort under siege, their friends and neighbors expelled, and their lives in danger. But instead of leaving, as their son pleads with them to do, they haul out a shotgun and decide to stay. On returning to the country of his birth, Rogers finds his once orderly and progressive home transformed into something resembling a Marx Brothers romp crossed with Heart of Darkness: pot has supplanted maize in the fields; hookers have replaced college kids as guests; and soldiers, spies, and teenage diamond dealers guzzle beer at the bar. And yet, in spite of it all, Rogers’s parents–with the help of friends, farmworkers, lodge guests, and residents–among them black political dissidents and white refugee farmers–continue to hold on. But can they survive to the end? In the midst of a nation stuck between its stubborn past and an impatient future, Rogers soon begins to see his parents in a new light: unbowed, with passions and purpose renewed, even heroic. And, in the process, he learns that the "big story" he had relentlessly pursued his entire adult life as a roving journalist and travel writer was actually happening in his own backyard. Evoking elements of The Tender Bar and Absurdistan, The Last Resort is an inspiring, coming-of-age tale about home, love, hope, responsibility, and redemption. An edgy, roller-coaster adventure, it is also a deeply moving story about how to survive a corrupt Third World dictatorship with a little innovation, humor, bribery, and brothel management.

Author : Peter Godwin
Publisher : Back Bay Books
ISBN 13 : 0316032093
Total Pages : 368 pages
Book Rating : 4.94/5 ( download)

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Download or read book When a Crocodile Eats the Sun written by Peter Godwin and published by Back Bay Books. This book was released on 2008-04-10 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After his father's heart attack in 1984, Peter Godwin began a series of pilgrimages back to Zimbabwe, the land of his birth, from Manhattan, where he now lives. On these frequent visits to check on his elderly parents, he bore witness to Zimbabwe's dramatic spiral downwards into the jaws of violent chaos, presided over by an increasingly enraged dictator. And yet long after their comfortable lifestyle had been shattered and millions were fleeing, his parents refuse to leave, steadfast in their allegiance to the failed state that has been their adopted home for 50 years. Then Godwin discovered a shocking family secret that helped explain their loyalty. Africa was his father's sanctuary from another identity, another world. When a Crocodile Eats the Sun is a stirring memoir of the disintegration of a family set against the collapse of a country. But it is also a vivid portrait of the profound strength of the human spirit and the enduring power of love.

Author : Alex Perry
Publisher : HarperCollins
ISBN 13 : 0062655639
Total Pages : 364 pages
Book Rating : 4.39/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Good Mothers written by Alex Perry and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NOW A MAJOR TV SERIES The electrifying, untold story of the women born into the most deadly and obscenely wealthy of the Italian mafias – and how they risked everything to bring it down. The Calabrian Mafia—known as the ’Ndrangheta—is one of the richest and most ruthless crime syndicates in the world, with branches stretching from America to Australia. It controls seventy percent of the cocaine and heroin supply in Europe, manages billion-dollar extortion rackets, brokers illegal arms deals—supplying weapons to criminals and terrorists—and plunders the treasuries of both Italy and the European Union. The ’Ndrangheta’s power derives from a macho mix of violence and silence—omertà. Yet it endures because of family ties: you are born into the syndicate, or you marry in. Loyalty is absolute. Bloodshed is revered. You go to prison or your grave and kill your own father, brother, sister, or mother in cold blood before you betray The Family. Accompanying the ’Ndrangheta’s reverence for tradition and history is a violent misogyny among its men. Women are viewed as chattel, bargaining chips for building and maintaining clan alliances and beatings—and worse—are routine. In 2009, after one abused ’Ndrangheta wife was murdered for turning state’s evidence, prosecutor Alessandra Cerreti considered a tantalizing possibility: that the ’Ndrangheta’s sexism might be its greatest flaw—and her most effective weapon. Approaching two more mafia wives, Alessandra persuaded them to testify in return for a new future for themselves and their children. A feminist saga of true crime and justice, The Good Mothers is the riveting story of a high-stakes battle pitting a brilliant, driven woman fighting to save a nation against ruthless mafiosi fighting for their existence. Caught in the middle are three women fighting for their children and their lives. Not all will survive.

Author : Zelda la Grange
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0147516277
Total Pages : 386 pages
Book Rating : 4.75/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Good Morning, Mr. Mandela written by Zelda la Grange and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2015-06-16 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An important reminder of the lessons Madiba taught us all.”—President Bill Clinton There are numerous books about Nelson Mandela, but Good Morning, Mr. Mandela is the first by a trusted member of his inner circle. In addition to offering a rare close portrait, Zelda la Grange pays tribute to Madiba as she knew him—a teacher who gave her the most valuable lessons of her life. Growing up in apartheid South Africa, La Grange, a white Afrikaner, feared the imprisoned Nelson Mandela as “a terrorist.” Yet she would become one of his most devoted associates for almost two decades. Inspiring and deeply felt, this book honors a great man’s lasting gift.

Author : Wendy Kann
Publisher : Henry Holt and Company
ISBN 13 : 1466802111
Total Pages : 308 pages
Book Rating : 4.17/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Casting with a Fragile Thread written by Wendy Kann and published by Henry Holt and Company. This book was released on 2007-04-17 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this poignant, lyric memoir, a sister's tragic death prompts a woman's unbidden journey into her turbulent African past. A comfortable suburban housewife with three children living in Connecticut, Wendy Kann thought she had put her volatile childhood in colonial Rhodesia—now Zimbabwe—behind her. Then one Sunday morning came a terrible phone call: her youngest sister, Lauren, had been killed on a lonely road in Zambia. Suddenly unable to ignore her longing for her homeland, she decides she must confront the ghosts of her past. Wendy Kann's is a personal journey, set against a backdrop as exotic as it is desolate. From a privileged colonial childhood of mansions and servants, her story moves to a young adulthood marked by her father's death, her mother's insanity, and the viciousness of a bloody civil war. Through unlikely love she finds herself in the incongruous sophistication of Manhattan; three children bring the security of suburban America, until the heartbreaking vulnerability of the small child her sister left behind in Africa compels her to return to a continent she hardly recognizes. With honesty and compassion, Kann pieces together her sister's life, explores the heartbreak of loss and belonging, and finally discovers the true meaning of home.

Author : Patricia Friedberg
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.59/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Letters From Wankie written by Patricia Friedberg and published by . This book was released on 2023-02-08 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Letters From Wankie by Patricia Friedberg

Author : Douglas Rogers
Publisher : Jonathan Ball Publishers
ISBN 13 : 9781868423620
Total Pages : 312 pages
Book Rating : 4.2X/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Last Resort written by Douglas Rogers and published by Jonathan Ball Publishers. This book was released on 2009-01-01 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Linwood Barclay
Publisher : M&S
ISBN 13 : 9780771010811
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.18/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Last Resort written by Linwood Barclay and published by M&S. This book was released on 2001-02 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1966, when his parents abandoned their suburban Toronto split-level to buy Green Acres, a cottage and trailer resort in Ontario’s Kawartha Lakes region, eleven-year-old Linwood Barclay’s life took an unexpected turn. No more rec-room train sets. Now Linwood was hauling fish guts to the woods for burial, answering distress calls from women in the ladies’ room who found themselves without toilet paper, and standing in leaky chest-waders pounding dock posts into the lake bottom. The chores weren’t so bad, especially when he could help his father, who had been a commercial artist before he bought his way into the tourist business. And in other ways, it was a good life for a boy. He had wheels (a John Deere riding mower), a small aluminum boat with a 9.5-horsepower outboard and only one speed (fast), and Chipper, a dog that chased boats the way other dogs chase cars, sometimes with catastrophically comic results. Linwood also had access to The Chart, a cottage reservations list that was, for him, a guide to the arrivals and departures of the guests’ teenaged daughters. Summer romances could be as intense as they were heartbreaking. When he was sixteen, an unexpected tragedy changed Linwood’s life again. His older brother, Rett, helped out as best he could, but he was wrestling with demons of his own – often withdrawing into his own complicated inner world. Linwood found an extended family in the resort’s guests, who lent him a hand, and shaped him into the man he would become. His mother’s eccentricities (she quit driving to shame the police for having given her a ticket) made Linwood’s new responsibilities heavier than they might otherwise have been. When he finally decided to move away from Green Acres to make a separate life, she made it as difficult as possible for him. In the midst of all this, Linwood found his vocation, and mentors, too, in Margaret Laurence, and in Kenneth Millar, who (under the pen name Ross MacDonald) wrote a highly successful series of detective novels. In this memoir, Linwood Barclay looks back with humour, sadness, and affection on the singular circumstances of his coming of age.

Author : Graham Atkins
Publisher : CreateSpace
ISBN 13 : 9781500906863
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.67/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Once Upon a White Man written by Graham Atkins and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2014-08-21 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From a colonial childhood, to the front-line of Rhodesia's vicious civil war, to the final disintegration of Mugabe's post-colonial Zimbabwe - this is the traumatic story of a conflicted young man who experiences the tragedy of his life and homeland being torn asunder. An honest and poignant insider's story which offers intriguing insights into the dilemma faced by patriotic white Africans trapped in the march of history... "A gripping love declaration to Africa. With the troubles of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe as background, the real protagonist of this book is Africa with all her wonders and horrors. Highly recommended for lovers of the continent, especially those longing for a well-balanced and honest account of recent African history" (review by Balazs Pataki, 2013). "The author remembers things that both racists and leftists would rather forget - the culture of humiliation and violence that made Rhodesia unsustainable, and the ugly silence of world opinion that made it possible for Mugabe to get away with genocide and ethnic cleansing. This book tore me from my political views and made me think seriously about the goals of humanity" (review by Avery Morrow, 2011)

Author : Oliver Nyambi
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 900468297X
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Contested Liberations, Transitions and the Crisis in Zimbabwe written by Oliver Nyambi and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2024-04-04 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How and when does culture enter the discourse on liberation, transition and crisis in an African post-colony such as Zimbabwe? In a deeply polarised nation reeling from a difficult transition and an unrelenting economic crisis, it is increasingly becoming difficult for the ZANU PF regime to prescribe and enforce its monolithic concept of liberation. This book culls, from contemporary (counter)cultures of liberation and transition, the state of liberations in Zimbabwe. It explores how culture has functioned as a complex site where rigid state-authored liberations are legitimated and naturalised but also where they are negotiated, contested and subverted.