Jambo, Mama [Hardcover]

Melinda Atwood (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2001

This ISBN is out of print. Please refer to ISBN 9781879384781 for the new paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

" A beguiling, frank and unpretentious memoir ..." --From Kirkus Reviews

From the Inside Flap

What is it about Africa that casts such a mysterious hold on its visitors? Even Melinda Atwood, a sophisticated New Yorker with a practiced ironic view, came under its spell on a 1985 safari. Falling in love at first sight with Kenya's beauty, this person who had only "roughed it" on the QE2, found herself inexplicably drawn to both the country and its challenges.

When three arduous years as caretaker for her dying mother ended, Atwood found herself adrift. The son she had raised as a single mother had left home for school leaving her all the more saddened and alone. An acrimonious lawsuit filed against her by family members was the last straw. Atwood decided to run away from home – to return to Africa. Planning to spend only one year, she remained for six.

Told with refreshing honesty and incisive wit, Atwood's memoir of her years in Kenya covers a wide range -from continual adjustment to life in Africa, to adventures in remote and dangerous areas. Along the journey she takes over a native carpet business, builds a house, and survives a tempestuous love affair.

You will laugh at her tales of finding her way and cry just as readily at her sensitive and unforgettable portraits of the people she took to her heart. Many of the colonial rules about the relationships between the races get broken along the way.

When Atwood says her last "taonana," to Africa it is bittersweet; you too will be sorry she is leaving and this wonderful story is over.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 311 pages
• Publisher: Cypress House (October 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1879384388
• ISBN-13: 978-1879384385
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,440,470 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #85 in Books > Travel > Africa > Kenya

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Review of Melinda Atwood's Jambo Mama, November 23, 2000

By 

Stian (Norway) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jambo, Mama (Hardcover)

It was in search of information about Africa I first stumbled across the pages of a travel agency. Available on their pages was Jambo Mama. For free. Why not, I thought, and downloaded the piece. After I had read the three first chapters, I had to find out if the story was true or fiction, but the travel agency didn't provide much information about either author or the book itself. What was provided, though, was ms. Atwoods e-mail adress. Contacting her personally, I asked about the story's validity. She could confirm that all was taken from her own first-hand experiences of the country, people and culture of Kenya. Wow! Talk about a major adventure...

Her story is the story about a girl who, upon returning from a vacation in Kenya, finds that the easy, urban life of America is not satisfactory. A yearning for the warm African nights and all that goes with it builds to an irresistable urge to move for a longer period of time. She thinks things over, and decides to pack up her entire life and leave. She rents a house in suburban Nairobi and begins a life almost from scratch. It is the story of a girl who experienced African life up close. Some of the challenges she faces include surviving rough safari's (not designed for the average tourist), running a small-scale business (the African way) and maintaining a social life. As any good story, it also includes some good romance...

Melinda Atwood writes with an easy language that is full of life. Even though you won't find the most profound metaphors in her all over elegant sentences, you start imagining yourself in her situation after a couple of paragraphs. Her book gives a great description of the many moods of that which lies under the African sun. You can even expect to pick up a couple of phrases in Swahili. I can recommend Jambo Mama to everyone who wants to know more about Africa, and especially Kenya, but also to anyone who enjoy a good story. If you, after reading this review and others, find the book unworthy your time and money: pole sana! (don`t understand? read the book)

Reviewed by Stian Rein Andresen and Øystein Tøsse Larsen

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Refreshingly honest, March 13, 2002

By 

Dkbonnell "Denise" (Mission Viejo, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jambo, Mama (Hardcover)

I thorougly enjoyed reading this book! Melinda is a wonderful and entertaining writer whose description of her life in Kenya was written with complete honesty and candor. I am afraid vanity would not have allowed me to be quite so honest. Her detailed accounts of her trials and triumphs kept me turning the pages. Since I have visited Kenya several times, and especially the Masai Mara Game Reserve, I felt as if I were right there with her. She wrote with compassion towards the people she knew and loved there, and best of all, she wrote with a sharp wit and an incredible sense of humor. I found myself laughing out loud often. It wasn't an easy thing she did, moving to Africa by herself for an extended period of time, for Africa and New York are as different as night and day. Melinda did, however, what so many others only think of doing...she followed her dream. For the reader who wants to learn more about modern Kenya, this book is for you. For the reader who wants a fun, interesting, informative, romantic, and heartfelt book to read, then don't miss this one. I highly recommend "Jambo Mama."

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars ~Helped me dream of Africa~, March 25, 2002

By 

*Q* "rusty spurs" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jambo, Mama (Hardcover)

Just finished reading this wonderful book this week-end! It's about a middle-aged woman with a dream to throw herself into "once-in-lifetime" adventure and fulfill a long time fantasy.....to live in Africa. I found her descriptions of Kenya and the other places she visited via Safari, to be informative and insightful yet at the same frightening and exciting. She describes her day-to-day life struggling to live out her dream. There are the cultural differences, language barriers, dangers, and the ever present lonliness but when she looks out at the vast beauty that is Africa, it is all worth it. She embraces each challenge with dogged determination to prove to herself that she can overcome the sometimes seeming insurmountable obstacles. I've never been to Africa and don't know if I'll ever get there in view of the dangers surrounding travel outside this country, but I was able to live vicariously through this magical memoir and dream.