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Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight

Audiobook
0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: About 6 weeks
0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: About 6 weeks
In 1972, when Alexandra Fuller was two years old, her parents finally abandoned their English life and returned to what was then Southern Rhodesia and to the beginning of a civil war. By the time she was eight, the war was in full swing.
Her parents veered from being determined farmers to being blind drunk, whilst Alexandra and her sister, the only survivors of five children, alternately take up target practice and sing Rod Stewart songs from sun bleached rocks. This memoir is about living through a civil war; it is about losing children and losing that war, and realising that the side you have been fighting for may well be the wrong one.
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    • AudioFile Magazine
      It's easy to see why this title has become such a popular choice with the book group set. This is an immensely powerful story. Reader Lisette Lecat is nothing short of a marvel. She brings to bear a wonderful depth and dimension through the use of multiple accents, including Pidgin English, and a gusty delivery of the author's childhood singing. Her beautiful tonal quality and talented performance illuminate an unblinking, unsentimental look at the end of colonialism in Rhodesia, and at many other locations around Africa--as a tough, loving, and seriously dysfunctional family tries desperately to farm and, yes, keep things under white rule. The author falls in love with Africa at the age of 2, and the slow, tragic decline of her family is mirrored in the chaos and poverty of this magnificent land. The miracle here is the voice of a child who retains her independence and level-headed practicality throughout. D.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from October 22, 2001
      A classic is born in this tender, intensely moving and even delightful journey through a white African girl's childhood. Born in England and now living in Wyoming, Fuller was conceived and bred on African soil during the Rhodesian civil war (1971–1979), a world where children over five "learn how to load an FN rifle magazine, strip and clean all the guns in the house, and ultimately, shoot-to-kill." With a unique and subtle sensitivity to racial issues, Fuller describes her parents' racism and the wartime relationships between blacks and whites through a child's watchful eyes. Curfews and war, mosquitoes, land mines, ambushes and "an abundance of leopards" are the stuff of this childhood. "Dad has to go out into the bush... and find terrorists and fight them"; Mum saves the family from an Egyptian spitting cobra; they both fight "to keep one
      country in Africa white-run." The "A" schools ("with the best teachers and facilities") are for white children; "B" schools serve "children who are neither black nor white"; and "C" schools are for black children. Fuller's world is marked by sudden, drastic changes: the farm is taken away for "land redistribution"; one term at school, five white students are "left in the boarding house... among two hundred African students"; three of her four siblings die in infancy; the family constantly sets up house in hostile, desolate environments as they move from Rhodesia to Zambia to Malawi and back to Zambia. But Fuller's remarkable affection for her parents (who are racists) and her homeland (brutal under white and black rule) shines through. This affection, in spite of its subjects' prominent flaws, reveals their humanity and allows the reader direct entry into her world. Fuller's book has the promise of being widely read and remaining of interest for years to come. Photos not seen by PW. (On-sale Dec. 18)Forecast:Like Anne Frank's diary, this work captures the tone of a very young person caught up in her own small world as she witnesses a far larger historical event. It will appeal to those looking for a good story as well as anyone seeking firsthand reportage of white southern Africa. The quirky title and jacket will propel curious shoppers to pick it up.

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  • English

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