The Power of the Sword

ALL WILBUR SMITH BOOKS ARE OUTSTANDING. I WISH THEY'D MAKE MOVIES OF HIS STORIES...............I HAVE PURCHASED EVERY BOOK HE HAS PUBLISHED!

I think I am in love with Wilbur Smith's version of Africa as much as reviewer 'Brenda'. He has a gift for getting to the heart of men of power and what shapes them and the continent they have fought to possess. I fell in love with Africa when I was 10 years old and found a Tarzan book in a used book store. My roommate in university was from Southern Rhodesia whose father was a newspaper publisher who was trying to get rid of the Ian Smith regime. Wilbur Smith gives a more gripping feel for Africa than either of those sources did. Whenever I need to come down from a too high stress life of my own, I sit down and read Wilbur Smith. Have been through all his trilogies several times and never tire of them.

This book was great - I plan to read all five in the series. I'm fascinated with Africa as described by Wilbur Smith.I wish to draw attention to the inadequate binding on several of these books. Every time I turn a page, it just falls out of the book. If it were any other author, I would not buy a Fawcett Crest paperback book - 600+ detached pages, it's outrageous. I'll bet the whole series is like that.

Mr. Wilbur Smith is one of my favourite novelists. His style, plot, rich knowledge and portrayal of political and ethnic conflict in Africa are some of many qualities that make me admire him. He tries to write objectively about the different peoples he portrays, though his identification with the "White Anglo" i.e. Whites of English descent is apparent sometimes beneath his facade of impartiality and tolerance. This shows least in this book however. The continuing struggle between the English and the Boers is portrayed in the conflict between Sean Courtney and Manfred de la Rey and their respective families. The Blacks slowly but surely enter into the struggle for power. The mentality and motivtion of each of the three groups is explored and beautifully conveyed. The surprising and complicated long lasting results of the endeavours of each group in the struggle for power is portrayed. The insensitivity and cruelty of the English in their treatment of the conquered Boers and their concentration camps (a British not Nazi invention) directly leads to the bitterness, fanaticism and pseudo-religious nationalism of the Boers, which indirectly culminates in Apartheid; The ANC leaders prefer the more oppressive Boers to the English, because tyranny and oppression can only lead to national unification and revolution, while the cunning British policy of giving them nominal rights with one hand and exploiting them with the other can only enchant more gullibles. The book was no less beautiful to me because I read just before going to South Africa in 1999. It helped explain many historical, political, even modern aspects in inter-cultural relationships that wouldn't have been apparent to me.

If you are looking for lots of action, Smith is one of the best. I have read quite a few of his books now, and haven't been disappointed.