Horn of Africa: A Novel [Hardcover]

Philip Caputo (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1980

When Vietnam veteran and foreign correspondent Charlie Gage is recruited by the shadowy Thomas Colfax to assist with something called Operation Atropos, he has no idea he is about to be enlisted for guerilla warfare in northeast Africa. Once he realizes he’s a mercenary, however, he is not at all concerned. Ever since his young secretary was killed by a grenade at their bureau office in Beirut a couple of years before, he has lost all volition. Which is why he so readily capitulates not only to Colfax, but also, and more dangerously so, to every command of Jeremy Nordstrand, the mystical megalomaniac determined to achieve greatness on their seemingly suicidal mission. Set in the forsaken yet exotic deserts of Ethiopia, Horn of Africa is a vividly detailed and masterfully plotted novel chronicling a broken man’s struggle for salvation and inner freedom in the midst of a broken nation’s fight for stability and peace.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Caputo here presents protagonist Charlie Gage, a journalist who is recruited for a mysterious job that essentially turns out to be serving as a mercenary in a mythical country in northeast Africa. His tour in Vietnam and his additional combat experiences as a correspondent, however, have left Gage with little stomach for fighting. There are many battle sequences, but the book also delves into the nature of evil and morality. This 1980 title remains "a notable and engrossing first novel" (LJ 12/15/80).
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Review

“Reminiscent in its passionate style and moral intensity of the best of Joseph Conrad.”–Newsday

“A real novel stuffed with excitement and filled with sharply drawn characters.”–The New York Times

“An extraordinarily powerful novelist who works in one of the grand traditions of literature: the fiction of nightmare against the background of war and espionage.”–The Dallas Morning News

“Does not suffer in comparison with Graham Greene or Joseph Conrad. . . . An awesomely evil tale–enthralling, disgusting, utterly first-rate.” –Jim Harrison --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 487 pages
• Publisher: Holt Rinehart & Winston; 1st edition (September 1980)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0030421365
• ISBN-13: 978-0030421365
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,126,454 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Novelist and journalist Philip Caputo (1941 -- ) was born in Chicago and educated at Purdue and Loyola Universities. After graduating in 1964, he served in the U.S. Marine Corps for three years, including a 16-month tour of duty in Vietnam. He has written 14 books, including two memoirs, four books of general nonfiction, and eight novels. His acclaimed memoir of Vietnam, A Rumor of War, has been published in 15 languages, has sold over 1.5 million copies since its publication in 1977, and is widely regarded as a classic in the literature of war. His 2005 novel "Acts of Faith," a story about war, love, and the betrayal of ideals set in war-torn Sudan is considered his masterpiece in fiction, and has sold 102,000 copies to date, His most recent novel, Crossers, set against a backdrop of drug and illegal-immigrant smuggling on the Mexican border,was published in hardcover in 2009 by Alfred A. Knopf and in paperback by Vintage in 2010. He is now working on a travel book, "The Longest Road: From the Southern Cross to the Northern Lights." It describes an epic road trip from the southernmost point in the U.S., Key West, Floirida, to the northernmost that can be reached by road, Deadhorse Alaska, on the Arctic Ocean. The journey took 4 months and covered 17,000 miles. Though it bears his unique stamp, the narrative fuses elements of John Steinbeck, Jack Keruoac, William Least Moon, and Charles Kuralt. Caputo interviewed more than 80 Americans from all walks of life to get a picture of what their lives and the life of the nation are like in the 21st century. He expects to finish in June of the year. Henry Holt will publish the book in May, 2013.

In addition to books, Caputo has published dozens of major magazine articles, reviews, and op-ed pieces in publications ranging from the New York Times, the Boston Globe, and the Washington Post to Esquire, National Geographic, and the Virginia Quarterly Review. Topics included profiles of novelist William Styron and actor Robert Redford, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the turmoil on the Mexican border.

Caputo's professional writing career began in 1968, when he joined the staff of the Chicago Tribune, serving as a general assignment and team investigative reporter until 1972. For the next five years, he was a foreign correspondent for that newspaper, stationed in Rome, Beirut, Saigon, and Moscow. In 1977, he left the paper to devote himself to writing books and magazine articles.


Caputo has won 10 journalistic and literary awards, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1972 (shared for team investigative reporting on vote fraud in Chicago), the Overseas Press Club Award in 1973, the Sidney Hillman Foundation award in 1977 (for A Rumor of War), the Connecticut Book Award in 2006, and the Literary Lights Award in 2007. His first novel, Horn of Africa, was a National Book Award finalist in 1980, and his 2007 essay on illegal immigration won the Blackford Prize for nonfiction from the University of Virginia.

He and his wife, Leslie Ware, an editor for Consumer Reports magazine, divide their time between Connecticut and Arizona. Caputo has two sons from a previous marriage, Geoffrey, a jazz composer and music teacher, and Marc, a political reporter for the Miami Herald.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Well written wanderings into the Heart of Darkness...., May 4, 2003

By 

Andrew Mendelssohn (Charlotte, NC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Horn of Africa: A Novel (Paperback)

Caputo' Horn of Africa is a well-written novel in a style that emulates or aspires to Graham Greene or Joseph Conrad. I enjoyed the book, and admired the writer but the story never completely 'clicked' for me.
Horn of Africa is a psychological/military thrill that takes place in a fictional province of Ethiopia, Bejaya, that closely resembles Eritrea but is not really supposed to be anyplace. The story is told through a first person narrative of one of the characters, Charlie Gage. Gage is a burnt out journalist hanging around Cairo. He's recruited by a simultaneously creepy, pompous and shadowy CIA character to go along on a clandestine mission to Bejaya to assist local rebels against the Ethiopians. Gage is joined on his mission by an uptight, by the book Britain with local experience and a larger than life American, Jeremy Nordstrand, with a borderline psychotic sociopathic philosophy about life and their mission. Nordstrand is both philosopher (in a base way) and soldier, with obvious capabilities despite his slightly unbalanced philosophy. Soon enough, he becomes the group's real leader. Nordstrand first willingly descends into violence, testing both himself and his idea of society, and then slowly descends into madness.
Caputo has Gage set the tone of the novel in the first two pages: the reader knows that this is not a story with a happy ending, and that ugly things happen. This is both good an bad: I thought it simultaneously gave a great sense of foreboding throughout the novel, but when the dark events occur they were anti-climatic.
Also, Nordstrand wore his psychosis on his sleeve, as did the British character. I had a hard time believing that they would be put in a position of power on an important mission, rogue or not. The story was interesting but the base premise, in my mind, was a little hard to believe.
Anyway, I don't think you will be disappointed by Horn of Africa. Its extremely well written with deep characterizations, and an interesting story. Is it quite up to Conrad or Greene? Maybe on one of the formers' worst days... but its still a good novel and a worthwhile read.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Blowing My Horn For Caputo, June 29, 2000

By 

Tim Smith - See all my reviews

This review is from: Horn of Africa: A Novel (Hardcover)

A well-written, descriptive, metaphorical voyage into the heart of darkness. Three mercaneries are hired to run guns to a guerilla group in Africa and train a rebel Moslem tribe. The three men are abandoned there to work out their own differences and personal salvations. Civilization as we know it did not exist, and the dark side of human nature is exposed; the side without restraint, pity or conscience.

This is another stellar piece of writing in Caputo's body of work. The Voyage and Rumor of War are also strongly recommended.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb, dark story of violence and irregular warfare, April 24, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Horn of Africa (Mass Market Paperback)

Why is this great book out of print? This is a modern classic, a superb, dark story of violence and irregular warfare in Northern Africa. Powerfully evocative of place and time, with three unforgettable main protagonists.