The Fear

Starred review from January 3, 2011
In this remarkable look inside Mugabe's isolated yet restive Zimbabwe, journalist Godwin (When a Crocodile Eats the Sun) and his sister, Georgina, return to their childhood home "to dance on Robert Mugabe's political grave"; that is, to observe firsthand the teetering of Africa's (and the world's) oldest tyrant at the critical moment of the 2008 elections. Although the elections promised an end to Mugabe's nearly 30-year dictatorship, even as the 84-year-old president has clung to power in a campaign of widespread terror. The depiction of the heroic (if "prissy") liberation leader against white-minority rule turned brutal power-monger is at once personal, well-informed, and at times, heart-racing. Godwin and Georgina tour the economically devastated and state-terrorized cities, farms, and diamond mines at considerable personal risk, gathering candid interviews with dispossessed farmers, marginalized elites, and former insiders to cast a light on the workings of Mugabe's dictatorship and psychology, and the "fear factor" crucial to his control. Godwin's skills as a journalist and his personal connection to Zimbabwe combine to create an astonishing piece of reportage marked by spare, stirring description, heartrending action, and smart analysis.

December 15, 2010

Godwin (When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa, 2007, etc.), a white Zimbabwean journalist schooled in and relocated to England, bears brave witness to the last brutal days of Robert Mugabe's dictatorship.

The author managed to infiltrate his devastated homeland during several months in 2008, when the 84-year-old dictator was finally voted out of power yet held on by a savage reign of terror and violence. Along with his younger sister, Georgina, a London broadcaster, Godwin toured the scarred land, interviewing victims of torture, rape and forcible land seizure, as well as officials such as the British and American ambassadors and the presidential opposition leader who was forced to drop out of the running. The author's account is harrowing and not for the faint-hearted. For example, visiting the south, where he and Georgina grew up, they spied people being pushed home in wheelbarrows, and only later did they learn that these were torture victims of Mugabe's interrogation houses, too weak to walk. Moreover, the hospitals began to fill with people battered because they dared to vote for the opposition. In the offices of the Counseling Services Unit in Harare, victims limped in, still in shock. Godwin relates these stories in pointed, immediate prose, as he, too, was horrified and amazed at this "torture factory," a system which "is ordained from the top, it is hierarchical, planned and plotted." With foreign journalists strictly banned from the country, the opposition removed to South Africa and the diplomatic community cowed but attempting "smart sanctions," Godwin's work serves as an invaluable, urgent dispatch from a country in the throes of an international humanitarian crisis.

The author's return to his beloved homeland transformed by violence and no longer familiar proves heart-wrenching and extremely moving.

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

March 1, 2011

In 2008, native white Zimbabwean Godwin (former foreign correspondent, Sunday Times, London; When a Crocodile Eats the Sun) returned to his home country, where the world's oldest dictator was struggling to retain his political power. Godwin intended to "dance on Robert Mugabe's political grave" after voters overwhelmingly rejected him. Instead, Godwin found his country engulfed in political violence orchestrated by Mugabe in an effort to punish opposition leaders and the ordinary Zimbabweans who had voted for them. The stories Godwin hears--from opposition leaders, displaced white farmers, and black Zimbabweans who are watching democracy fail them--are each more horrific than the next. The most harrowing chapters relate the torture and murder of individuals. Readers learn that in Mugabe's Zimbabwe, voting is a crime that can cost you your home, your family, and your life. The bravery of torture victims telling their stories is remarkable. VERDICT The risks that Zimbabweans take for democracy, for their friends and families, and for their country are extraordinary. While much of the book is bleak and frankly grim, there are instances of personal courage and bravery that speak to the strength of the human spirit. A difficult but essential read; recommended.--Julie Biando Edwards, Univ. of Montana Lib., Missoula

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2011
Returning to his native Zimbabwe in 2008, Godwin had hoped to dance on Robert Mugabes political grave. But though Mugabe had been voted out as president, he did not concede power, instead sponsoring a brutal campaign of violence to crush his political opponents and suppress dissent in a land already devastated by hyperinflation and Mugabes compulsory land-redistribution program. Chronicling the violence, the suffering, and the chaos; recounting the stories of torture survivors and victims of politically motivated vigilantism; and examining Mugabes biography and politics (and placing himself in significant danger in the process), Godwin only occasionally recognizes the Zimbabwe of his childhood. But, finding heroism and resistance in the face of horrific carnage, he discovers a side of the nation that he had not known before. Much more than just the authors third memoir of Zimbabwe (after Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa, 1996, and When a Crocodile Eats the Sun, 2007), this selection is an important work of witness.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)