Review: Enchanting Fantasy Set in - of all places! - Rainforest Africa!
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 11 14, 2013
I loved the beginning of this book. The sights, scents, and tastes of Africa are lavishly described in this book.  I learned of beautiful African lingo new to me such as mahobohobo and nyanga. The author spent years living in Zimbabwe, in Africa and it definitely shows.  She writes of the African flora and fauna with a familiarity that more than equally matches ours of boreal forests, elk, and groundhogs in Europe or North America.The magic is enchanting. Various shapeshifters pop up throughout the book, transforming from humans to African animals with ease, and vice versa. Many of them befriend and aid Ethan, the primary character in this book.I was spellbound perfectly until the point where Ethan and a determined group of boys resolve to find a missing friend, named Joe, and enlist telepathic crocodiles and a graceful leopard (who are also shapeshifters).  After that, the plot got a little confusing for me, with plenty of misfortunes, skirmishes, newly introduced characters, and majestic locations.  If the author had streamlined the encounters and adventures in a more linear way, I might have been able to track who was who and what was happening.  There were dozens of names of various characters at the mid-point in this book, and I was unable to keep up with the frequent new dollops of information.  I wasn't sure who the enemies were sometimes; I knew that the Almohad had tried to capture the witch, and then the boys encounter the Tokoloshe, but wasn't sure what the connection of these two tribes had with each other, or who were the antagonists (the Tokoloshe seemed quite friendly as time went on!).  The original mission was to find Joe, the boy who disappeared when the witch switched with him, but developed into much more complicated consequences with more new tribes and lost cities.But for a majestic tapestry, with fascinating African folklore and mythology, I definitely recommend this book!