Eye Of The Leopard

From the creator of the acclaimed Kurt Wallander series: A thrilling story set in Sweden and Zambia told with “heart-stopping tension” (Entertainment Weekly). Interweaving past and present, The Eye of the Leopard draws on bestselling author Henning Mankell’s deep understanding of both Scandinavia and post-colonial Africa. Hans Olofson arrives in Zambia in the 1970s, at the start of its independence. There, he hopes to fulfill the missionary dream of a boyhood friend who was unable to make the journey. But he is also there to flee the traumas of his motherless childhood in provincial Sweden: his father’s alcoholism, his best friend’s terrible accident, his fear of an ordinary and stifled fate. Africa is a terrible shock, yet he stays and makes it his home. In all his years as a mzungu, a wealthy white man among native blacks, he never comes to fully understand his adoptive home, or his precarious place in it. Rumors of an underground army of revolutionaries wearing leopard skins warn him that the fragile truce between blacks and whites is in danger of rupturing. Alternating between Hans’s years in Africa and those of his youth in Sweden, The Eye of the Leopard is a bravura achievement and a study in contrasts—black and white, poor and wealthy, Africa and Europe—both sinister and elegiac. “Mankell’s novels are a joy.” —USA Today “A fascinating novel . . . [the] prose is powerful, and the narrative of The Eye of the Leopard is profound.” —Bookreporter.com “A thought-provoking, multilayered novel whose themes will challenge and linger.” —The Courier Mail “Mankell is a master of atmosphere and suspense.” —Los Angeles Times “Mankell’s novels are the best Swedish export since flatpack furniture.” —The Guardian “Beautiful, heartbreaking, yet ultimately hopeful . . . A powerful exploration of the stresses and challenges of freedom.” —Booklist, starred review

Set in the 1860s, The Leopard tells the spellbinding story of a decadent, dying Sicilian aristocracy threatened by the approaching forces of democracy and revolution. The dramatic sweep and richness of observation, the seamless intertwining of public and private worlds, and the grasp of human frailty imbue The Leopard with its particular melancholy beauty and power, and place it among the greatest historical novels of our time. Although Giuseppe di Lampedusa had long had the book in mind, he began writing it only in his late fifties; he died at age sixty, soon after the manuscript was rejected as unpublishable. In his introduction, Gioacchino Lanza Tomasi, Lampedusa's nephew, gives us a detailed history of the initial publication and the various editions that followed. And he includes passages Lampedusa wrote for the book that were omitted by the original Italian editors. Here, finally, is the definitive edition of this brilliant and timeless novel. (Translated from the Italian by Archibald Colquhoun.)

Do genes explain life? Can advances in evolutionary and molecular biology account for what we look like, how we behave, and why we die? In this powerful intervention into current biological thinking, Brian Goodwin argues that such genetic reductionism has important limits. Drawing on the sciences of complexity, the author shows how an understanding of the self-organizing patterns of networks is necessary for making sense of nature. Genes are important, but only as part of a process constrained by environment, physical laws, and the universal tendencies of complex adaptive systems. In a new preface for this edition, Goodwin reflects on the advances in both genetics and the sciences of complexity since the book's original publication.

"If the eye expresses life and soul and what lives inside, leopards are the eye of Africa, linked through a connective nerve directly to what this continent means and symbolizes." —Dereck Joubert National Geographic filmmakers Dereck and Beverly Joubert have worked with dangerous wildlife in Africa for years. They have produced more than 20 award-winning films, as well as some of the most beautiful wildlife photography in existence, and their conservation efforts have included establishing game reserves and regrowing rain forests. Eye of the Leopard is a visual celebration of these beautiful cats, the country they call home, and two photographers with a lifelong passion for photographing them. Upon finding a mother leopard and her three-day-old cub, the Jouberts capture the remarkable beauty of one leopard’s life and follow her gripping story as she battles to survive and complete her own life’s journey into motherhood. Their documentary of the same title won them their fifth Emmy Award for Best Achievement in Science, Nature, and Technology.

In her captivating memoir Through the Leopard's Gaze, Njambi McGrath details the harrowing circumstances of her life as a young girl in Kenya, who one fateful night was beaten to a pulp and left for dead. Thirteen-year-old Njambi, fearing her assailant would return to finish her, courageously escaped, walking through the night in the Kenyan countryside, risking wild animals, robbers and murderers, before being picked up by two shabbily dressed but safe men. She buries the memories of that fateful day and night, and years later ends up in London with a British husband and children. Then one day a simple unassuming wedding invitation arrives in her mailbox causing her to have to confront the remnants of a past she had thought was behind her. This is a book about survival, and courage when all else fails. It's a searingly honest examination of human cruelty and strength in equal measure.

The fourth book in the epic Ballantyne series Craig got no further, for Tungata's anger turned to red fury. He was shaking with it, it clouded his gaze and knotted the muscles at the points of his heavy lantern jaw. "Be silent,'he hissed. 'You meddle in matters that you do not understand, and that do not concern you. Leave this land before they overwhelm you."' His family's past. His country's future. Bestselling author Craig Mellow is tired of fame, and wants only to return to his family's old home in Zimbabwe. Although it's now derelict, Craig wants to rebuild and turn Rholands into a functioning ranch and tourist safari, but finds his way unexpectedly blocked by his old friend, now government minister, Tungata Zebiwe. Working with acclaimed photographer Sally-Anne Jay, Craig is able to uncover Tungata's corruption and continue with his planned restoration. However, there is new fighting on the horizon that may threaten not only Rholands, but the lives of all who live there. In their desperate attempts to escape, Craig and Sally-Anne will learn that no one is truly who they say...

"Spots of a leopard" is a quest into manhood. When journalist Aernout Zevenbergen moved to Kenya, he had no idea that his encounters with life would inspire him unto a journey of self-discovery. What is love? When is a man a good father? Can friendship conquer loneliness?Zevenbergen asks questions few have dared to ask men. Faced with their honesty, the author gets to confront his own demons too.