Zambia: Scribbling the Cat by Alexandra Fuller
Thoughts: I had a high school teacher from Rhodesia. She was always smugly paternalistic about being from Rhodesia, about being our teacher, about life in general. I guess growing up being told you are better than ninety percent of the people around you gives you a sort of desire to be smugly paternalistic about life. I always wanted to slap her a little bit when she talked about Rhodesia. It was like there was no concept that there were non-whites that lived there too. I kind of felt the same in this book. There are black Africans in it, but that doesn’t seem to be the point. The point seems to be something else that maybe not being from Rhodesia I don’t really understand. Maybe my high school teacher would.
I really thought there would be something to this book but it’s pretty much fluff. I was interested but kept thinking that there must be someone out there who has done this better. Everything is so shallow with hints of unease when it could have wrenched your heart out instead. Fuller’s holding herself back in this. Or maybe she just doesn’t feel the necessity to let herself go.
Rating: 3.5/5