Kenya - Softcover

John Halkin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0708822959 ISBN 13: 9780708822951

Publisher: Futura Publications, 1983

Synopsis

In 1896, engineer John Andrews, accompanied by his young wife Hester, arrives to build the Uganda Railway through uncharted land and faces an unruly work force, disease, hostile climate, and resisting natives

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

Set largely in Kenya around the turn of the century, when European colonialism there was at its height, this robust and historically authentic tale centers on the efforts of a Scottish engineer to build a railroad from Mombasa to Uganda, in the heart of the wild continent. John Andrewessp ok? em pursues his goal undaunted by hostile natives, wild animals, squabbles among his workers, German competition and the forbidding terrain through which he must blast his way; but his greatest trial comes in the form of a colleague with whom he is forced to share his young wife's affections. Halkin, who worked as a BBC producer in Kenya, is at pains to capture the viewpoint not only of the colonists but of the Kikuyu and other tribesmen, who for the most part watched the white man's expropriation of their land with mounting alarm. It is a saga mixing adventure, violence and romance, populated with vivid characters and told with an evehandedness that does much to explain the conflicting tensions in this tumultuous period of Africa's development.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Halkin's setting is the eastern African area now known as Kenya in the period from the late 1800s to World War I. Scottish engineer John Andrewes arrives with his young wife, Hester, to build the Uganda Railway. He had performed a similar task in India; and many of the laborers are from India, imposing yet another culture on the fearful local tribes. Kamau, whose life becomes intertwined with that of John and Hester, represents one native viewpoint. Once the railway is built, John and Hester turn to farming. The story is interesting, describing living in the rough as the railroad is built, contending with epidemics and native attacks, and trying to establish an agrarian economy. Halkin is less successful in his depiction of characters and their motivations. Still, recommended for historical fiction collections. Ellen Kaye Stoppel, Drake Univ. Law Lib., Des Moines
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Futura Publications
• Publication date: 1983
• ISBN 10: 0708822959
• ISBN 13: 9780708822951
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 428