Blood Safari

by Deon Meyer

Book Overview

Published to rave reviews around the world, Blood Safari is a harrowing new novel from acclaimed writer Deon Meyer. Like the best international mystery and thriller writers, Meyer is an expert... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0307356620
• ISBN13: 9780307356628
• Release Date: March 2009
• Publisher: Random House Canada
• Length: 374 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A South African Jack Reacher

Lemmer (no first name given) is a loner who is employed by a South African Company called Body Armour, which is a security company headed up by an ex-regimental sergeant major named Jeanette Louw. Lemmer is a bodyguard. He's tough as nails, has served time in prison for manslaughter (unjustly as far as he's concerned). He's a recovering alcoholic. He lives by two simple rules, which are, 1. Don't get involved and 2. Trust nobody. Emma la Roux is a brand consultant from Cape Town and she needs protection. She thought she saw her long lost brother on television. But before she can investigate three masked men break into her beach house. She was lucky enough to get away with her life. Now she wants two things, to find her brother and to stay alive. So she calls Body Armour and gets Lemmer. Emma's quest takes them to several game preserves as it appears that her brother is wanted for the killing of a witchdoctor who has killed protected vultures for ceremonial reasons among other crimes involving conservation. And all along the way they are followed and Lemmer dispatches his fair share of bad guys. There is quite a bit of background in this story involving recent South African history and the country's problems, but the author doesn't let it get in the way of the story. So, you'll learn a bit, get a bit of opinion and also you'll get one great story. If you're a fan of Lee Childs, you're going to love this book, because Lemmer is the next best thing to a South African Jack Reacher.

happy to discover this author

Bodyguard Martin Lemmer is hired by Emma le Roux to protect her after her home was broken in to by masked men. She fears the break in may be related to her brother, who she thought had been dead for the past 20 years. Lemmer has a shady past but is tough and has the skills to handle the men who are trying to kill Emma while she investigates the evidence that her brother may be alive. Blood Safari has an intricate plot, well drawn characters, and enough thrills to keep you reading as fast as you can. Deon Meyer's setting of South Africa offers a fascinating look into the country's political and racial tensions, while giving us a heavy dose of adventure. It's a combination that works quite well. I'm looking forward to reading Meyer's other books.

Riveting and thoughtful South African action thriller

The myriad tensions of South African culture fuel the intense and intricate thrillers of Afrikaans writer Meyer. His fifth takes place largely in South Africa's game parks where conservationists (mostly white) clash with poachers and the legal claims of impoverished tribes. Feelings run hot on all sides, but when the killing of fourteen rare vultures leads to the murder of five black poachers, the conservation-worker suspect triggers an angry manhunt and a media blitz. A young heiress, Emma le Roux, spots the suspect's photo on TV and becomes convinced he's her brother - missing and presumed dead twenty years. After her inquiries spark a home invasion, she hires the narrator, Lemmer, a skilled bodyguard with a violent past. A brooder and a moralist who recognizes his own faults, Lemmer lives alone in a remote area where limited social contact keeps him on the straight and narrow. He and Emma are both Afrikaans and the freight and baggage of ethnic identity plays a strong, but not transparent role in their relationship to each other and their country. As Lemmer digs and the story's mystery grows, Meyer turns the spotlight over to several secondary characters who deliver what would be, in lesser hands, lectures. Meyer manages to illuminate without browbeating, demonstrating the hopeless intractability of many of Africa's opposing views, particularly as concern the land. The story is suspenseful, with plenty of action, and strong, spare writing to match. While the over-the-top ending is all too believable, the final element clashes with character in a way that seemed as unnecessary as it was jarring. But Meyer is a powerful writer and anyone interested in the complexities and majestic beauties of South Africa - and a good, hard-boiled, page-turner - will not want to miss this one.

"He who needs to say `I am no racist, but...' is one."

Deon Meyers just keeps getting better and better with each thriller. Setting his novels in contemporary South Africa, he raises the bar for thrillers by infusing each of his novels with national political tensions--historical, racial, and economic--emphasizing the urban and rural disparities which make the country so complex and so difficult to govern. His "heroes" have traditionally been far from "heroic" in the traditional sense, always people at odds with society, especially in the case of Lemmer, main character (and hired bodyguard) in Blood Safari. Lemmer is guarding Emma le Roux, a wealthy young woman who, after seeing a news story on TV, believes that her brother Jacobus le Roux, thought dead for twenty years, is, in fact alive--a suspect, under a different name, in a series of murders. She has no idea whether her suspicions about her brother are correct, nor does she have any idea what motive might inspire evil-doers to have attacked her. Always interested in conservation, Jacobus le Roux worked at the Kruger Park, where he disappeared twenty years ago. A man called Jacobus de Villiers is a suspect in the current Kruger Park murders and has also worked at the Moholololo Rehabilitation Center, which nurses ill and wounded vultures, and at a private reserve which tries to keep large areas of the veld free of development for a natural animal habitat. As Lemmer tries to find out if the Jacobus de Villiers whom Emma saw on TV is, in fact, her brother, they are exposed the life-or-death infighting among the various conservation groups, the sometimes mysterious relationships between conservation police and local law enforcement, and the relationships and conflicts of these groups with developers and local tribes who want a piece of the tourist game-park action. Violence is a way of life for these people, and Lemmer is often in the cross-hairs of his and Emma's unknown enemies. Meyer is careful to include all the players in the game here, allowing him to present all the facets of the big picture regarding the wildlife bounty of the country--conservation vs. the lures of development; commitment to a lawful country under unified rule vs. the every-man-for-himself attitudes which undermine the country; and open and honest dealings between enforcement agencies and private interests vs. payoffs and blackmail. No one knows whom to trust, if anyone, and no one knows what secret arrangements any of the players may have made with sleazy operators who exist outside the mainstream. As the characters develop more fully, and as the author reveals more and more information about their backgrounds, the reader's stake in the outcome bigger and stronger. The action comes fast and furious, and the suspense builds. Meyer creates vibrant scenes, describing the environment, the local settings, the animals, and the racial interactions of South Africa's citizens in vivid detail. This is a terrific and unusual thriller, the fifth of Meyer's novels, all of which

A stunning thriller - worth the read

I love it when books take me to a world I have very little knowledge about - this is one of these books. Taking place in South Africa, both in the city and subsequently in Kruger National Park and the lowveld, the thriller is a breathtaking tour de force with extremely compelling characters and a very well developed and surprising plot that will have even seasoned mystery readers turning the pages to the very end. The story is told from the perspective of taciturn bodyguard Lemmer who is hired by a young woman after she has been attacked in her apartment and is able to escape. Lemmer has his reservations about the wealthy Emma who believes that she saw a picture of her brother as the wanted man in the murder of wild game poachers - her brother who disappeared in 1986. Lemmer himself is a difficult man with a past who has spent four years in prison for manslaughter in an incident of road rage. As Emma drags Lemmer across the South African National Parks in search of the truth about her brother, she is targeted again and danger seems to increase with every clue the two discover. At the same time their relationship begins to change and before he even realizes it, Lemmer sees more than a client in Emma. Meyer's writing is compelling, with excellent character development and a plot that is absolutely air tight. An extremely rewarding read!