Born Wild by Tony Fitzjohn
My April review was for Born Wild: The Extraordinary Story of One Man's Passion for Africa
by Tony Fitzjohn
I was expecting some really warm fuzzy and sometimes tragic stories of animals when I opened this book. That isn't quite how it went however, and the biography/memoir is more of a factual chronology that spends more time on politics than animals. Still it was a fascinating read to see how other viewpoints and countries are so similar and so different.
It has the passionate pleas of conservation throughout as Tony is a conservationist, and one can see how it is needed. However, I did get a bit bored of all the descriptions of geography and layout, I have a hard time picturing everything in my head and would have preferred a quick map and skipping the paragraphs that tried to tell what one simple picture would have done better.
I did appreciate having pictures to see some of the things he was talking about, and the people, and especially the animals!
I think the reason the animal/human relationships were so downplayed is that his focus is on returning them to the wild, and bonding with humans (even though it occurred) is counterproductive to his goal, so of course he couldn't publicize it. Also, the book having been put together and written by others as well as him, they had to stick more to dry facts than anecdotes.
I found myself more drawn to the relationship between him and "the Old Man" than any other part of the story, yet that too was barely addressed in any storytelling sense.
Overall, I enjoyed the read, but I wouldn't recommend this as a story to appeal to animal lovers, but more to conservationists.
Or, read it on site and rank my review as helpful or not.
You can find my library here if interested.