Africa Memoir

It was in the nature of Belgium’s withdrawal from Africa that power was essentially handed over to the first in line to receive it. Very little of the careful preparation that characterized the British withdrawal from Africa was evident in Congo. As it turned out, the first in line to take power was a tall, stern-featured ideologue by the name of Patrice Lumumba. This audiobook looks at one of the most important African leaders of the 20th century.

In his short life, the Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial revolution, leading movements in North America, South America, the African continent, and the Caribbean. In each locale, Rodney found himself a lightning rod for working class Black Power. His deportation catalyzed 20th century Jamaica's most significant rebellion, the 1968 Rodney riots, and his scholarship trained a generation how to think politics at an international scale.

Wilbur Smith has lived an incredible life of adventure, and now he shares the extraordinary true stories that have inspired his fiction. From being attacked by lions to close encounters with deadly reef sharks, from getting lost in the African bush without water to crawling the precarious tunnels of gold mines, from marlin fishing with Lee Marvin to near death from crash-landing a Cessna airplane, from brutal school days to redemption through writing and falling in love, Wilbur Smith tells us the intimate stories of his life that have been the raw material for his fiction.

Author Remi Adeleke takes listeners back to stories from his childhood as Nigerian royalty to losing his father early in life and being financially stripped of everything by the Nigerian government. He delves into being raised by a single mother in the Bronx and doesn’t shy away from the illegal activities that threatened to derail his future. Having gone through times of intense struggle, pressure, and failure, Adeleke shares his inspiring story of overcoming the odds, even when it didn’t make sense; and ultimately experiencing true personal transformation.

On September 17, 1961, Dag Hammarskjöld boarded a Douglas DC6 propeller plane on the sweltering tarmac of the airport in Leopoldville, the capital of the Congo. Hours later, he would be found dead in an African jungle with an ace of spades playing card placed on his body. Hammarskjöld had been the head of the United Nations for nine years. He was legendary for his dedication to peace on Earth.

These are the combat experiences of the first Marine to command a special operations task force, recounted against a backdrop of his journey from raw Second Lieutenant to seasoned Colonel and Task Force Commander; from leading Marines through the streets of Mogadishu, Baghdad, Fallujah and Mosul to directing multi-national special operations forces in a dauntingly complex fight against a formidable foe.

Durant's experience as a prisoner in Somalia grew increasingly bizarre, crystallizing a clash of cultures by turns frightening, melancholy, hilarious, and strangely familiar. Revealing never-before-told stories with the incisive thought and emotion of one who was there, In the Company of Heroes is one man's unforgettable, true story of going to hell and making it back alive.

Lloyd Camp takes you on an evocative journey through some of the wildest places in Africa as he relives colorful vignettes from his adventurous childhood and long career as a safari guide. This is a charming, funny, thoughtful, and often hair-raising series of short stories that illustrate Lloyd's enthusiastic delight in leading his clients into the wilderness areas of Africa. Forthright yet lighthearted, Lloyd's suspenseful narrative emphasizes both his love of the African bush and the courage and resilience of the Africans that he encounters in his odysseys.

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' parents were caught in the cross fire, everything changed.

Soraya was just 15 when she was given the honor of presenting a bouquet of flowers to Colonel Gaddafi, the "Guide", on a visit he was making to her school the following week. This one meeting, a presentation of flowers, a pat on the head from Gaddafi, changed Soraya’s life forever. Soon afterwards, she was summoned to Bab al-Azizia, Gaddafi’s palatial compound near Tripoli, where she joined a number of young women who were violently abused, raped and degraded by Gaddafi.

In 2013, South African businessman Daniel Janse van Rensburg set off to the West African country to finalise a legitimate airline contract with a local politician. Within days, Daniel was arrested by the local Rapid Intervention Force and detained without trial in the island’s infamous ‘Guantanamo’ cells, and was later taken to Black Beach. This is his remarkable story of survival over nearly two years, made possible by his unwavering faith and the humanity of a few fellow inmates. In this thrilling first-person narrative, Daniel relives his ordeal.

When Rosamond Halsey Carr first arrived in Africa, she didn't realize that she would spend the rest of her life there. As a young fashion illustrator living in New York City in the 1940s, she seemed the least likely candidate for such a life of adventure. But marriage to a hunter-explorer took her to what was then the Belgian Congo, and divorce left her determined to stay on in neighboring Rwanda as the manager of a flower plantation.

In an age of bolters - women who broke the rules and fled their marriages - Idina Sackville was the most celebrated of them all. Her relentless affairs, wild sex parties, and brazen flaunting of convention shocked high society and inspired countless writers and artists, from Nancy Mitford to Greta Garbo. But Idina’s compelling charm masked the pain of betrayal and heartbreak.

When André de Ruyter took over as Eskom CEO in January 2020, he quickly realised why it was considered the toughest job in South Africa. Aside from neglected equipment, ageing power stations and an eroded skills base, he discovered that Eskom was crippled by corruption on a staggering scale. De Ruyter takes the listener inside the boardrooms and government meetings where South Africa’s future is shaped, with ministers often pulling in conflicting directions, and candidly reflects on his three years at the power utility.

The last ruler of the House of Solomon, Haile Selassie, was not only the final Emperor of Ethiopia but also the link to a bygone past. In the days of Haile Selassie, absolute rule was given as an unquestioned divine right. Even though Selassie in many ways was a moderate progressive, he was still an autocratic ruler.

Africa in the 13th century lay in ruins due to countless civil wars and the ensuing famine. Amid the hopelessness arose a man who began to rebuild the ravaged diaspora. He instituted a government that was so efficient at managing the country of Mali that soon it was the most progressive nation on the continent. Not long after, one by one, the neighboring countries began to join the fold, until all of West Africa constituted a single empire.

In 1994, Nelson Mandela became the first president of democratic South Africa. Five years later, he stood down. In that time, he and his government wrought the most extraordinary transformation, turning a nation riven by centuries of colonialism and apartheid into a fully functioning democracy in which all South Africa’s citizens, black and white, were equal before the law. Dare Not Linger is the story of Mandela’s presidency, drawing heavily on the memoir he began to write as he prepared to finish his term as president, but was unable to finish

In this new book, Kidder gives us the superb story of a hero for our time. Strength in What Remains is a wonderfully written, inspiring account of one man’s remarkable American journey and of the ordinary people who helped him–a brilliant testament to the power of will and of second chances.

Based on years of investigative reporting and unprecedented fieldwork, Walking the Bowl immerses readers in the daily lives of four unforgettable characters: Lusabilo, a determined waste picker; Kapula, a burned-out brothel worker; Moonga, a former rock crusher turned beggar; and Timo, an ambitious gang leader. These children navigate the violent and poverty-stricken underworld of Lusaka, one of Africa’s fastest growing cities.

The Super-Afrikaners, originally published in 1978, scandalised a nation as it exposed the secret workings of the Broederbond. Out of print for over three decades, this edition with an introduction by Max du Preez is available for a new generation. Political journalists Hans Strydom and Ivor Wilkins traced, at great personal risk, its development from the earliest days to the present. The book includes the most comprehensive list of Broeders ever published.