Customer Reviews

Conjuring Maud

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If you are looking for an adventure and love story right out of Africa, this is for you. It's the story of a young man that meets his soul-mate in a very unlikely place with a very unlikely older woman, Maud. This is a magical trip with unexpected twists and turns throuhout. I just curled up with a cup of Java and let this wonderful story transport me far away from the present reality that lies just outside my door. It's like a calgon bath for the soul!

The lush, vibrant and often harsh landscape of colonial West Africa provides a stunning backdrop to this tale of offbeat characters and an unconventional love.

David Unger, son of a prosperous physician turned destitute prospector, recalls the pivotal events of his life. After attending military school, he serves as an ambulance driver for the British Army during the Zulu Rebellion. From an Indian sergeant-major called Bapu (who will later change his name and become a central figure in Indian history), David learns the secret that enables him to make an astounding escape from a Zulu cave prison. After the war, David travels to England to pursue a medical education.

Foremost in his devotion is the intrepid British explorer Maud King. Maud's character is based on the real-life explorer of the period, Mary Kingsley. Sixteen years David's senior, Maud captivates him as no other woman ever will. The two share more than just an affinity for the peoples, flora and fauna of West Africa. They are soul mates in the deepest sense of the term. While their age difference raises eyebrows amongst Maud's fellow gentry in England, the true obstacle to their happiness is Maud's passion for her work.

Mr. Danze fills this short tale with unforgettable secondary characters and subplots and wraps the whole package in a spare, elegant prose that reads easily and suits his subject matter well.

Philip Danze's Conjuring Maud is a novel about David Unger, an aging circus magician who recounts his younger days in colonial West Africa, and how his profession changed from medicine to magic. The heart of the novel lies in David's unusual, close, and sometimes erotic relationship to Maud King (loosely based on the British feminist and explorer Mary Kingsley), a British explorer and ethnologist 16 years older than David, whose devotion to the resplendence of Africa and its people is unmatched among mortals. Liquid, subtle, and at times bittersweet in its mystery, Conjuring Maud is a work of literary magic, transporting the reader back in time to life in colonial Africa with its careful attention to detail.

David Unger looks back to his youth in Africa when his dad dallied with Cecil Rhodes. He knows that the pivotal moment in his life was when he, a sixteen year old cadet; met the renowned explorer Maud King. David voluntarily became Maud's personal "mailman" just to see his idol. As he matures, he begins to understand the spell his heroine inadvertently cast on him.

David turns from medicine to circus magician as he is in love with the intrepid much older Maud. Even being drafted by the English army to fight the Zulu insurrection against Anglicizing the African countryside and to defend claims to the diamond mines only impedes, but does not stop his love for the older woman that owns his heart; in her way Maud loved him back. David knows that no other woman compared.

CONJURING MAUD is a vividly descriptive account of life in late nineteenth century "British" Rhodesia and South Africa obviously through the loving first hand account of David, but also indirectly that of Maud and other key players. The tale provides a fabulously insightful look at 1880s Southern Africa through a scrutiny of a varied cast members to include miners struggling to hold onto diamond claims, British soldiers fighting a losing war to Anglicize the land (sound familiar?), and the various tribes squabbling whether to revolt or bow to the other continent Queen. This winning historical fiction is worth reading due to Africa, not Tarzan's land or that of western propagandized White Burden onus, but as a beautiful land of diversity and conflict that shows how much Philip Danze enjoyed writing this labor of love.

Harriet Klausner

best book i have read in years. an exciting adventure story with romance and a little magic. you can almost feel the heat and dampness of the jungle in wild africa. quite a fantastic book, i couldn't put it down.