Customer Reviews

Blood Safari

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

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.

To date, I have written 974 reviews for Amazon, several of them for mysteries and thrillers. This is the first book in that category that I have rated a '5'. Usually I like mysteries and thrillers but don't love them. This book is in a category of its own. It is just that damned good. I loved it from beginning to end. I loved the intricacy of the plot, the quips, the characterizations, its literary bent, and the down-home feeling of the dialogue.

Without any spoilers, this novel is about a bodyguard named Lemmer who is hired to protect Emma, a young woman who was recently assaulted in her home. She tells Lemmer that she believes that her brother, long thought dead, is actually alive. She wants to find him but she believes that her assault is the result of her trying to investigate what she knows about her brother on her own. Lemmer does not believe her story. He has some personal beliefs which he calls his 'laws'. "Lemmer's First Law: Don't get involved. It was also one of the primary sources of Lemmer's Second Law: Trust nobody". (p. 12) Emma is also petite and pretty. For Lemmer, that, too, is a strike against her because he believes that cute women lie and manipulate more than average. If you watch the TV show 'House', Lemmer reminds me a lot of 'House'.

Emma and Lemmer travel throughout South Africa and face dangers of all kinds at every call. There is mystery, intrigue, and thrilling action in this book. I have already ordered two other books by this author: Devil's Peak: A Novel and Heart of the Hunter: A Novel. I suspect that I'll be reading all his books and looking forward to new ones coming out.

Deon Meyer is a terrific author with writing skills that should shoot him to the top of the mystery/murder genre. In Blood Safari he has created a likeable bloke, Martin Fitzroy Lemmer, a body guard for hire. Lemmer - only uses this part of his name - is an interesting and fully evolved character by the end of the book. Meyer uses flashback thinking and story telling to bring all of the pasts to the present. And he tells a fascinating story of South Africa through the characters.

It has been a while since I have found an author to follow. Most of my current favorites are going downhill. Meyer writes Africaans through a terrific translator that loses nothing in this story. There are twists and turns a plenty as Lemmer attempts to protect a attractive, white and rich South African on her trek to find her long lost brother. Within the story Meyer weaves some thoughts about how Apartheid has affected the racial climate in South Africa. He also winds the story around the environmental issues that will have to be dealt with. However, I did not feel that that book was "preachy" or I would have downgraded it to a lower star total.

Why a four instead of five stars? Mostly, I don't give out 5 stars to this genre unless the book is off the charts. While it is a very solid read and very entertaining, it wasn't quite enough for me to give it the highest rating possible. The ending was satisfying, but has a little too much artistic license - I grade stories by the amount of artistic license that the author takes. I do recommend this book and author to others that are looking for a new name in the genre; this book is definitely worth it.

Blood Safari is a great change of pace for American readers- the exotic locales are maybe the least of the difference. Meyer packs a lot into the thriller format- meditations on why men do violence, why some women are unapologetically sexual, the differences between Afrikaners and English-speaking whites...there's a lot going on. I had to go back and re-read the last 40 pages or so before I was sure I understood how all the threads of the plot fit together, as the plot harkens back to the 1980's and the civil war in Mozambique. The main character, Lemmer, is, to put it mildly, complicated. I'm holding back one star for something Lemmer's boss- who runs her own bodyguard firm- does that seems totally out of character, even as it advances the narrative.

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.

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 are written in Afrikaans and translated, and each of which has been better than the last. n Mary Whipple

Dead at Daybreak
Dead Before Dying: A Novel
Devil's Peak: A Novel

I wanted to like this book, I really did. For one, the premise sounded so interesting. I'm fascinated by Africa, by its dangerous wildlife, beautiful scenery, and troubled history. What there is of it in this book is really interesting and, had there been more, I would have liked the story better. Though there are elements of a political thriller here, I felt they were so buried that it did them real disservice. Equally interesting was the contrast between conservationists and those whose livelihood depends on the use of that land and/or its animals, such as poachers. But for a book that is also ostensibly about the issue of how Africa's lands and animals are used, the topic is treated rather superficially. It would have been very interesting to get more perspective on what motivates the poachers or why some of the tribes to kill certain animals. Meyer, in my opinion, missed both of these opportunities.

Instead, what the novel provided was a lot of exposition. Lemmer, the main character, is a real mystery up until around a third to a half of the way through the book. Meyer drops hints of a troubled past but doesn't provide any detail. I thought this was a great way of piquing the reader's interest until, suddenly, Lemmer unloads everything. I just did not like the long expository paragraphs in which we learn everything there is to know about Lemmer's past. I felt that this really took away from the character. I couldn't see why his past wasn't told in flashbacks linked to some of the small clues dropped in the beginning parts of the novel. I can see how some readers might be hooked by this but it is a technique that doesn't interest me, as a reader. To know nothing about a character and then to learn everything in one fell swoop is too much of a disappointment. I needed to be more intrigued by what Lemmer was hiding before his entire history was suddenly unlocked.

Another device that the author used that I found rather annoying was the constant and obvious foreshadowing. I found the wording of the foreshadowing to be amateurish and to give too much away. I'll give the author the benefit of the doubt and chalk the wording up to a problem with the translation. Still, I felt that it was simply overused, so that I had the notion that each chapter I read began with Meyer dropping a giant bomb about what was about the happen. It would have had more impact, in my opinion, had the reader not been anticipating some of what was to come. I felt like the element of surprise was totally lost in this novel.

At the end of the day, I also just did not really care for Lemmer as a character. It wasn't that I actively disliked him, I just never arrived at a point where I actually felt something for him. I found him to be a pretty immoral character. This isn't necessarily a bad thing but a character such as this has to be very carefully done. Stieg Larsson did it with great effect in the character of Lisbeth Salander. However Lemmer, for me, simply didn't work. I never felt like I was inside of his head and, while he did have a pretty tragic backstory (and I'm giving nothing away here--it's obvious early into this novel that he's had a bad past), I just couldn't feel any sort of sympathy or empathy for him.

As for the ending, I found it to be rather preposterous. Given all of the events of the novel, it just seemed highly unlikely that things would end as they did. The forces against which Lemmer is working are very sophisticated yet, in the end, they are trumped far too easily for my taste. I appear to be in the minority here with my criticisms of the novel but, really, it just did not work for me.

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.

I chose this book because I was under the impression that it was a mystery. It was a mystery to some extent but the mystery was secondary to the central theme of the book - life in South Africa and the struggle between those who want to keep it as "natural" as possible and those who want to make as much money as they can off of that nature.

The two lead characters are Emma, a woman from a wealthy family who is searching for her long lost (and presumed dead) brother, and Lemmer, the quiet man she hires to be her bodyguard as she begins her search trying to figure out what has happened to him.

The book moves at a fairly slow pace as the two characters try to unravel the mystery while getting the distinct impression that there are those who will stop at no lengths to keep them from figuring out the mystery. Lemmer is skeptical about Emma's story and is probably a little too slow to figure out that the suspicious occurrences are more than just coincidence.

As an American who has never been to this part of the world, this book was an opportunity to learn about life in South Africa and the forces that are pulling the region in different directions. The mystery probably takes a bit longer to unravel than it should but it does not take away from the enjoyment of being taken into this world. The writer does a credible job of building the inevitable romance between the two leads so that the reader can actually understand why these two would end up together (and not just because they are a man and a woman thrust together).

One minor complaint/warning - the writer assumes that the reader has some knowledge about South African life and terminology so there were many times I had no idea what he was talking about. That is a relatively minor complaint as the book overall is an enjoyable trip into a new world.

Emma Le Roux is getting dressed when her Cape Town home is broken into by three masked men. She manages to get away, and she's convinced that the break-in has something to do with her brother Jacobus, a man whom everyone believes has been dead for twenty years. Emma hires professional bodyguard Martin Lemmer to protect her while she investigates. Lemmer is a true tough guy with a checkered past and the skills that would normally keep Emma safe, but when she's critically injured Lemmer commits himself to finishing her investigation even though his own life is now in danger.

This book grabbed me by the throat and would not let go. The translation is beautifully done, and the settings on the game preserves of South Africa lend the perfect note of the exotic. If you're leery of snakes, there is one scene in this book that could give you nightmares. I didn't have nightmares, but I certainly was jumpy for an hour or two after reading it. (I can still get nervy just writing about it!)

Lemmer is a fascinating character, and not just because he has a questionable past. He has prejudices-- he willingly admits to them-- but when he's shown that he was wrong to think that way, he's a person who can admit his mistakes, apologize, and learn from them.

Meyer's plot is well-woven and moves like a wildfire. I did not want to put this book down. I had to know how this cast of characters fit together. I had to know what was going to happen next.

Above the fast-moving plot, above the intricately drawn characters, is the land of South Africa. Meyer gives strangers to his country a well-seasoned taste of life in that land-- not only for humans, but also for the animals in that unique area of planet Earth.

I don't read that many thrillers because the ones I have read tend to skimp on elements that I consider to be very important: characterization and setting. It's been my experience that thrillers are all about plot. Deon Meyer has made me see that this "ain't necessarily so." There can be thrillers with rich settings that you can see and hear and taste. There can be thrillers with characters so well-drawn that you feel as if you know them. There can be because I've just read one-- Deon Meyer's Blood Safari.