Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12244 in Books
• Published on: 1991-10-31
• Binding: Paperback
• 416 pages

Synopsis
'A most extraordinary parable about mankind ...quite unlike anything else I have ever read' - "Sunday Express". 'I live on Brazzaville Beach ...I am here because two sets of strange and extraordinary events happened to me ...One in England, first, and then one in Africa.' On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater examines the complex circumstances that brought her there. Sifting the details for evidence of her own innocence or guilt, she tells her engrossing story with a blunt and beguiling honesty that not only intrigues and disturbs but is also completely enthralling.

Customer Reviews

out here on the perimeter we is imaculate
This came out when we worked in Nigeria in the late 80s early 90s. It got around the VSOs and the conservation people, we read it brown and furred. It was the description of the pilot who nicked the jets - I've met that guy. And the last page on Plato's unexamined life. That and the insights into the bitchy politics of the ape world - the monkey people found it was a bit too close to the bone and wondered which outfit he'd worked with. Gombe stream or Mahale? But it stuck - the name Hope Clearwater is wonderful and back in Sussex or Bedfordshire we knew what she faced. Sure he's been there, he has the sounds of Africa. This book is an old friend. It leans in and smiles, Ehhh and gives a funny handshake.

Do read it!
Brazzaville beach manages to be very clever and very accessible at the same time. It also reads like a thriller at times and the readers find themselves turning page after page, eager to reach the end and understand what is so wrong in monkeys' land.The part of the story that is set in England is more slowly-paced but doesn't slow the book down too much and is there for a reason. It is cleverly interwoven with the African part and the whole book makes great fiction.

Disjointed but entertaining
I picked this book up in great anticipation as a huge William Boyd fan. Whilst I did enjoy the book I did feel it was a little disjointed. The book looks at three periods of Hope Clearwater's life and they are handled quite separately. I did not like the fact that you knew where the character ended up right from the start but there were so many twists and turns that by the end of the novel it really didn't matter. I found the whole thing a little disjoined but the individual stories were compelling so though the whole was a little dissatisfying the book did keep me entertained. The book does have it disturbing moments but I would certainly recommend it to anyone.