West with the Night

Customer Rating:
Summary: How I found this ...
Comment: I am not quite sure how I happened upon this book but i am glad I did. The writing is a beautiful portrait of Kenya in the early 20th centure. Written from the view of English settlers, Beryl Markham was quite a character. Rumor has it that she may not have penned the book herself. I would like to learn more.

Customer Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written account of life in East Africa
Comment: My grandparents went to East Africa in the 1920s. My grandfather, a Scotsman, was looking for gold, my grandmother, a South African was looking for romance. My mother was born in the year this book opens.
When I was a child my mother regaled me with stories of scorpions, leopards amd pythons, and this book rekindled my memories of childhood.
It is a well-written account of a wild child's life in Kenya, hunting with the local people, being hunted by the local animals, and seeing the tribes as they were before tourism took over.

The author seems to take everything in her stride, and nothing seems to bother her. A bull elephant intent on killing her, flying blind over the Med, engine problems over Newfoundland, nothing seems to faze her.
I wasn't surprised to see that this book flopped on its original release in 1942 - it was an every day account of life as it was then.

But in 2008, things are very different and this is a very good account of early settler life in Kenya, White hunters and early aviation. I was sorry when I finished it, and wished it had been much much longer.

Customer Rating:
Summary: West With the Night
Comment: An excellent book!
Ernest Hemingway wrote, "She writes rings around us!" and he wasn't just being nice!
A good story, well written; what more could you ask for?!

Customer Rating:
Summary: West with the Night
Comment: I read this book because someone suggested my family might have been related to Beryl Markham, which is not the case, but...
What a woman - this is a true account of one of the first bush pilots in Africa, Beryl Markham, who was the first pilot to fly westward across the Atlantic from England. Although there is some dispute whether she actually wrote this autobiographical account (some say that her paramour, who edited the book, actually wrote it - she never confirmed or denied it), the stories are true and fascinating, encouraging the reader to learn more about her. The writing style is wonderful and interesting - no wonder Hemingway loved it. You wouldn't know this book was first published so many years ago.

Customer Rating:
Summary: Reads like fiction
Comment: I agree with Hemingway that this is a piece of high literature that reads like fiction and spreads itself before the reader like a well-produced film. It drove me to learn more about the author and her life.