Rating: 3.25 stars
Buy Link: Amazon | All Romance | Amazon UK
Length: Novel
In the wake of a devastating attack, Heath Crowley has lost everything—his family, his partner, even his will to live. He will do anything to escape the suffocating pain and finds himself on a one-way flight to Tanzania where he proceeds through the Serengeti to a tribe of Maasai. The nomadic tribe takes him in, albeit reluctantly. The men ignore him, the women exclude him, and the children are frightened of him.
Damu is a member of the tribe; he is charged with taking responsibility for Heath—now named Alé. Able to converse in somewhat broken English, Alé feels immediate gratitude towards Damu. The man feeds him from his own stores, shows him the ropes, offers him simple acceptance and companionship. As Damu instructs Alé in the ways of the Maasai, a kinship begins to grow between the two. For Alé, this slow-growing connection is shocking in it’s ability to dull the agonizing ache left in his heart after losing his partner. Indeed, during the pitch-black nights in the tiny mud hut Damu calls home, the two begin a shy exploration of the kinds of physical comfort two humans can share.
Yet all is not picture-perfect. Damu has always been, quite literally, on the fringes of society. He is shunned by dint of being born because his mother did not survive, whereas he did. Starting anything remotely close to a romance with a Westerner would possibly be bad; but having any physical relationship or even finding love with another man is a crime punishable by death. When Damu’s jealous older brother discovers the two in a compromising position, hard choice will have to be made.
I am separating this review into two distinct parts: 1) How this story is a deliciously angsty M/M romance and 2) How this book certainly satisfied the Around the World Challenge, yet left me deeply disappointed.
To be perfectly clear, I think this is a prime example of a melodramatic M/M romance. There’s nothing quite like watching characters face seemingly insurmountable odds and, well, surmounting them. Damu has always been on the fringes of his Maasai society, ostracized by the stigma associated with the shame of his mother dying giving birth to him. For all that he is shunned, Damu uncomplainingly contributes to the tribe and keeps to his assigned place. He is respectful and dutiful even when his fellow Maasai would not (or could not) afford him the same courtesy; in short, he embodied the perfect Good Boy. When Heath arrived a broken man, the village elders assigned him to Damu’s care. The two shared Damu’s tiny mud-and-dung hut as well as Damu’s domestic chores like gathering water. Heath immediately picked up on and privately raged against the unfairness of it—how such a paragon of a man could be treated like dirt. Yet for all that Damu’s people neglected him, Heath saw and appreciated Damu for the good man that he was. It’s something of a foregone conclusion that the two would develop a friendship…that turned into something more.
The shy sexual awakening of Damu is sweet and tender. Walker does a good job showing and demonstrating the shifts in the relationship between Damu and Heath. This is certainly helped by the sheer goodness and goodwill Damu shows Heath. It’s like Damu’s teaching Heath how to survive in Tanzania helps Heath re-learn how to live his life. When they deepen their connection physically, it’s Damu who helps Heath come to terms with and lay to rest past devastation. In turn, Heath helps Damu understand the urges he feels and together, they explore physical connections that lead to full consummation of their relationship. Ever vigilant that one slip could cost them their lives, Damu and Heath have a period of blissful togetherness. Of course, the longer they get away with getting their way, the more the reader dreads the tender, exciting scenes between the two lovers because you know the other shoe is gonna fall. When it does, it was nothing less than exciting.
In a nutshell, this is a great romance—especially if you like damaged characters redeeming themselves or virginal heroes “fixing” said damaged characters. Quite apart from the romance aspect, I chose this book for the Around the World Challenge for our Reading Challenge Month. In that regard, this book obviously fits the bill. I’d say 85% of the action takes place in Tanzania. Walker tries to set the scene and captures at least the basics on the Maasai culture. Their compounds are enclosed with fences of thorns; they judge their wealth at least in part in terms of how much livestock they have; theirs is an utterly patriarchal society with rigidly defined gender roles to support the lives of the tribe’s people. As far as what the eye can behold where the Maasai and Tanzania are concerned, I thought Walker did a passable job.
Although the physical setting of the book felt satisfactory, I was—bluntly—extremely let down by how Walker seems to ignore the cultural aspects of life with the Maasai. There’s more to the Maasai than the clothing they wear (shuka), the food they eat (mostly ugali, a state starch dish made of corn), the jobs they do (the men herd, the women….er, make beads?). There were inklings into their culture, but each falls rather flat in my estimation. For example, there’s scene at a feast where one of the main antagonists begins a courting ritual that shocks his tribesmen given the recipient is a refugee who has no status. The shortcoming here is that there were no details given about what the courting ritual was, nor did any of this courting stuff get reiterated in any form with our MCs. Another example was how Walker took pains to set up a scene where the Maasai were sharing some of their oral traditions (fables) but the fable wasn’t shared with the reader. I think of the Igbo people in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and despite the vast differences in culture and period, the Igbo tale of the turtle and the birds was relatable to me because of its parallel to a Japanese pop song by one of my favorite artists. Maybe these people live in mud huts without running water or electricity, maybe theirs is a culture that lives and dies by its patriarchal rules, yet there are sure to be some aspects that an outsider can understand…if only the author would take pains to share them.
One other major criticism I have a lot of the subtext I get from Heath. For one thing, there seems to be a “Chosen One” vibe to him. Heath has these deja vu-like visions of the future, but unlike regular deja vu, he is often able to remember them and act upon them—which results in him being a walking deus ex machina, able to save the kids from a wildebeest stampede or other such god-like behavior. What niggles about this is that here we have the white guy with this quantifiable special ability. Ugh.
Then, there’s the whole White Privilege/First World vibe. As broken, as devastated as Heath was, how much of an asshole do you have to be to pack a backpack, hop on a plane and throw yourself at the mercy of perfect strangers in a foreign country? Then throw in the fact that he’s gone to a nomadic tribe in Africa where they have no running water, no electricity, and live and die by the lands they inhabit…having some dude rock up expecting to just assimilate to their lifestyle is ludicrous. Heath doesn’t speak the language and he doesn’t know how to be a productive member of their society (I guess it’s lucky there’s ostracized Damu who speaks pretty good English there to hold his hand). Ugh.
On a final note about Heath—as good a fit for Damu as he is, when it’s time for them to escape the country, I was pretty disgusted by how Heath handled the whole process once they left the tribe. Heath buys clothes for himself, but not Damu (at first, anyway) because Heath thinks Damu being in his traditional garb will make a stronger case for getting Damu a “special circumstances” visa out of Tanzania. Despite taking an airplane from the closest airport to the Maasai village, it’s not until they reach Dar es Salaam (the biggest city in Tanzania and where they intend to board a plane to leave) that it crosses Heath’s mind Damu will need a passport/etc. How could Heath forget this after boarding a plane to get to Dar es Salaam in the first place?
Overall, I liked the romance. I liked the basic tropes our two main characters embodied and thought Walker did a perfectly acceptable job showing us basic life with the Maasai. That said, I was hugely disappointed with the story’s lack of “soft” cultural inclusions and the subtext I got from Heath when considered outside the context of his romance with Damu.
This review is part of our September Reading Challenge Month for Around the World Challenge Week! Leave a relevant comment below and you will be entered to win a fabulous prize from Riptide Publishing. One lucky winner will receive a selection of print Advanced Review Copies of Riptide books before they are even released (non-US winners will get ebook copies upon release instead). Commenters will also be entered to win our amazing grand prize sponsored by Dreamspinner Press (a loaded Kindle fire filled with DSP books!). You can get more information on our Challenge Month here, and more details on Around the World Challenge Week here. And be sure to check out our prize post for more about the awesome prizes!
What an excellent review. Although I enjoy Ms. Walker’s work, I think I’ll be skipping this one in favor of something less…contextually-challenging.
If you enjoy Walker’s work, I still think you’d probably enjoy this. As a story, it’s just fine. It’s got all the right elements…I was just disappointed the author eschewed what I consider the “meat and potatoes” of setting a story in a different culture.
I was interested to see this on the list. I am a big NRW fan but the blurb on this one always had me leaving it on the shelf so to speak. I think having read your review (great one, btw) it is the white entitlement, expecting to be looked after comments that resonnated with my reluctance.
I probably will get it at some point but not just yet.
If you’re a NRW fan, I think you’ll like this book just fine. Because I picked this book specifically as an Around the World Challenge (and having traveled extensively myself, lived in a foreign country where my native language isn’t the lingua franca, just in general having “been around”) I had certain…Expectations.
On the surface, NRW delivers…but it just didn’t go beyond the surface, and that bothered me, personally, with regards to the challenge. That said, the romance is hawt as hawt and, setting aside my armchair activist tendencies, I enjoyed at least an effort to include a not-oft featured locale.
Thanks Camille
Thank you for an interesting review. NR Walker is one of my favorites and I have read every book of her. I loved most of them so I will give this one also a try.
Well, if you like NR Walker’s work, I think you’ll like this one just fine. My only other exposure with Walker’s work was Cronin’s Key which I emphatically Did Not Finish…the style just felt so jejune. Maybe that speaks volumes about the quality of writing/development in this story 🙂 Happy reading!
Oh, Cronins Key was one of a few books from NR Walker I really didn’t like much. But she has so many good books written :-I
Well, I guess I hit the wonky-donkey jackpot where Walker books are concerned! I’ll keep that in mind (and an open mind) next time I run across a blurb that looks good and turns out to be by Walker 🙂
It’s too bad Blood and Milk did not work so well for you. I read it when it came out and, while I did not like it as much as some of her other books, I enjoyed it quite a bit.
I liked the romance aspect of the story, the sketch of the two characters. Even the visual representation and surface details of the Maasai were passable, but the devil’s in the details and I just felt that was clumsily handled. As far as straight up M/M romance, this gets a total pass 🙂
Thanks for the review! You are the second person I’ve read that wasn’t over the moon about this book. I haven’t had the time to read it yet but I will, that’s for sure. However, after reading the “choosen one” thing… eh? I like that in paranormal books. Contemporary non-paranormal? Thanks but no thanks.
Well, if you’ll allow me to expound on that “chosen one” thing…Walker doesn’t make the white guy out to be a God among mere mortals, but when you pare down the characters, that’s the definite impression I was left with. Heath has these visions of the future, many of which he can act upon to save a life/avert a catastrophe/etc; he’s physically special (heterochromia, i.e. each eye is a different color).
If you’re at all interested in the premise, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed…but when I extracted the base elements of what’s going on and what’s missing, I was left annoyed by the broad strokes that emerged.
I’m probably more of a superficial reader so I bet, to a large degree, I wouldn’t have really noticed
the cultural part because I would’ve been too engrossed in the romance. I”ll probably give this one
a try. Great review!!! Thanks. 🙂
If you’re bag is a good romance game, I think Blood & Milk will deliver! The love story is rather sweet and plenty steamy. I enjoyed watching Damu overcome the ingrained sense of taboo over physical pleasure 🙂
I absolutely loved this book. I re-read the end a few times. I loved how Heath made Damu feel comfortable after leaving Africa. I’m a huge fan of this author and immediately buy any new books as well as re-reading her older books.
I’m glad you enjoyed this book! I liked the romance aspect of it, but thought the cultural side of Tanzania was a bit too glossed over for my tastes. It is nice, though, to have a go-to reader because sometimes, you just want a sure-thing kind of read!
This certainly sounds like an unusual setting (for me, at least) for a romance. I’m sorry the cultural aspect fell flat for you though it was good to hear that the romance part of the story worked. Thanks for an informative review.
I was stoked to find such an “unusual” (from a Western M/M romance perspective, anyway) setting! Walked did an okay job painting a visual picture of Tanzania, but yeah…the actual cultural bits felt like they were cherry picked to match the action in the plot without going deeper. That said, there is not a lot to complain about when it comes to the straight up get-together romance story. I’d encourage you to give it a try if you think it sounds interesting…if nothing else, you’ll get a tender, sweet romance.
Thank you for the in depth review. I was thinking about giving this one a try.
I’d love to know how your interpretation compares to my review! If you do give it a whirl, let me know what you thought!
Thanks for the review — N.R. Walker’s books are not really my type but looks like you enjoyed it 🙂
I enjoyed it enough 🙂 The only other Walker story I’ve attempted was an emphatic DNF, so I was pleasantly surprised this one was compelling enough to finish.
Good review. The setting in Africa and circumstances of the MC makes this an interesting one for me.
The setting was both hit-and-miss for me. I liked the visual descriptions of the locale, but felt the fleshing out of the actual culture was a bit lacking. Still, the over all read isn’t bad, especially if you want a sweet, tender romance.
Thank you for the thorough review. The setting of this book sounded interesting but I has some reservations based on the blurb that were things you touched on as well.
As a generic M/M romance, I didn’t have any issues with the story. That said, there were some Issues (capital I) that I thought could have been handled/addressed better, so I was a bit disappointed that what sounded like it could have been an amazing exploration of what is probably a wholly different speed of Life gets kind of passed over in favor of focusing on the romance/sex.
Camille, I so appreciate that you looked at this book in all the ways. I understand that a lot of romance readers just want a swoony-worthy romance and don’t want to think about all the societal implications of what they’re reading. I usually can’t separate the real world we live in and the fictional ones I visit when reading things based in real places. I will always think on how the author has treated the characters and their experiences as if they were reflections of their real world counterparts. This one was a story I’d already decided wasn’t for me, and your review underscores that decision. There are so many reviewers who don’t get into implications of things you touched on, and it’s heartening to see that you did.
Well, I’m chuffed you liked my attempt at a multi-faceted stance at reviewing! This wasn’t the kind of book that was pure and simple romance for romance’s sake or erotica…so it was something of a letdown that what I consider major aspects of setting the international scene got neglected. It was also sort of wild distilling the characters and their actions into their base elements and realizing there are some…well, disappointing (even if unintentional?) reinforcements (specifically, the white guy being the special one and performing feats no one else can).
I wasn’t sure if it was something I ought to have focused on, but what started off as potentially a one-off thing about a character almost snowballed into Heath being The Chosen One and I has some serious quibbles about that representation and, ultimately, how is sort of threw the balance between the leads out of whack and once noticed, it was hard to un-notice.
Thank you for the thorough review, Camille. I must recognise this book had caught my eye because of its “alieness”, it cannot get much more different from my cultural background than the Maasai society. I’m so disappointed it fails to get deeply into it… Sometimes there is too much focus on romance, and the background or what makes the book unique may be left aside… Anyway, the romance seems interesting, so I’ll keep it in mind for the future.
While Walker doesn’t completely ignore the Maasai culture, the elements used on-page focus on describing physical life there and there’s precious little exposition on what actual culture is. Even if I hadn’t picked this up as an Around the World Challenge, the way a lot of the action pans out disagrees with my sense of balance when it comes to major players in a book, too–that is, Heath is this larger-than-life character who can literally do whatever he wants and Damu is special just by association…almost like an accessory to Heath, you know?
That said, if you’re keen on sweet romances, I think there’s still plenty to enjoy about the book.
I read this earlier this year and found it very moving and totally engrossing. I had never read anything quite like it before and found the details about life with the Maasai really interesting…
I’m glad you enjoyed it! I’d agree that the love story is pretty engrossing 🙂 I just thought there wasn’t enough care put into showing us what Maasai culture is beyond their physical way of life. There must be more to Maasai life than herding for the men and bead making/hut mending for the women…but we’d hardly know it reading this story.
Thank you so much for your detailed review. When I’m reading a book about people from a different culture, I want to immerse myself in the details about that culture. This one will be a pass for me.
If you like Walker’s work, you might still enjoy this. The cultural aspect focuses on physical life in the tribe rather than the “soft” aspects like what oral traditions might shape their world-view (hell, what their world-view is…they speak bit of English, but why?) or how language shapes their world view (case in point: people whose native languages that lack distinct future tense and present tense are better at saving money than people whose native languages have a distinct present tense and future tense. Why? Possibly because your language shapes your concept of time…what might be hidden in the structure of Maa language? If you’re interested in the whole theory/study: https://www.ted.com/talks/keith_chen_could_your_language_affect_your_ability_to_save_money?language=en)
I could see how certain aspects of the tone would be really annoying. It’s a shame, because I’ve never seen a romance (let alone an m/m one) set in Tanzania, and that part is pretty intriguing…
While I wouldn’t say I felt transported to Tanzania *specifically* I did feel like I got to experience a story firmly set in a non-Western place. There are strong nods to overt cultural aspects (like no running water, the patriarchal structure) even if they appear mostly pretty must just like that (or, perhaps more accurately, “ugh, the *patriarchy*” followed by a sorry/not sorry judgy power frown)
If you like Walker’s work, you still might want to give this a go 🙂
This sounds like a fascinating story, but I think I’ll probably be passing. Thanks for your honest review, Camille!
I was pleased at finding a book set in Tanzania (especially given the period news stories about the hardcore stigma homosexuals face in many parts of Africa in general). My expectations for an immersive, engrossing cultural experience were dashed but the romance was spot on (at least it was for me…until I started really paring it down).
Thank you for your review. I love NR Walker and the Red Dirt Heart serie is my all time favorite 🙂 For some reason i haven’t read this book yet? But i will definitely read this in the near future.
I hope you enjoy it! The romance story is certainly noteworthy 🙂
Thanks for the great review! This sounds like it’ll be a miss for me.
The book was more of a miss for me, too. Compelling romance isn’t exactly *easy* to write, but when half the story hinges on portraying another culture and that falls flat, it does take some of the enjoyment out of the read.