Rui Perreira is a young adventurer, born in Lisbon in the beginning years of the modern age.

When he hears of the legend of the lost civilisation of Afar in Africa, and discovers a map to the ancient city, he sets out to the mbanza of the Manikongo Nzinga a Mbemba in the Kongo, in search of the place.

He finds the Kongo in the wash of a war of it’s own, and he flees the Mbanza, following the map, which takes him deep into the territory of an enemy that is far more dangerous than he imagined, and foreign to anything he has ever encountered.

His journey takes him through the dark jungles of the Kongo basin, and into the dry lands of the Sahel. What he finds there, is different to anything he could have anticipated, and more deeply meaningful than anything life, as he had known it, could offer.

REVIEW

Africa. Just the word instills a feeling of adventure and danger. To Rui Perreira, Africa means the fullfillment for a dream of gold and glory and the chance for a life with the beautiful Catalina, his childhood sweetheart. For Dela Eden, it means home and a way of life. A chance meeting between these two very different people sets in motion a chain of events that are both wonderful and horrifying at the same time. These events change everything for Dela Eden and Rui, making them both realize that sometimes one must give up the things believed most precious to gain something more.

At first glance, this book looks to be a historial adventure full of strange and exotic places with danger lurking in every page. However, once the reader begins their journey, they will start to see incredible details into a lost world. This story has elements of intrigue into old world politics and social standards with a dash of romance. I very much enjoyed this story and feel that I will continue to find some new detail with additional readings.

Reviewed by: ebook Guru

EXCERPT

Rui woke to the sting of the rawhide on his face and a boot in his ribs. His eyes flew open. Diogo stood over him, a thick vein pulsing across his forehead.

“You stupid boy,” Diogo screamed.

Rui yelped in pain and scrambled to his feet, shaking with anger. It was a tenuous position he was in, a ship’s boy, in the infancy of his maritime career, challenging a captain sailing at the pleasure of the King of Portugal. “I did nothing,” he yelled. “Except right your wrong.” He breathed into his painful belly. “She would have died on this trail.”

“She will die anyway,” Diogo’s lips twisted bitterly. “You have done her no favours, ship’s boy.” He stormed off through the gathering crowd. “Find her,” he shouted, waving a fist at the Mbundu who accompanied them. “Bring her back.”

Rui retrieved the leather strips from the ground and dropped them into his pocket. His future as a captain in this, the era of the great discoveries, was finished; yet he celebrated with her, for her escape was his, in a way, too. She had taken with her the fraction of him that was still wild and free.

When they reached the escarpment and began their climb onto the plateau, to the mbanza, the capital city of the Mani Kongo, Nzinga a Nkulu, the heat became unbearable and Rui’s thoughts turned to his own survival: to his own life and his love back home, the fate of the slave girl forgotten.