Robert Gribbin spent thirty years in Africa as a diplomat, volunteer and voyager. He climbed Africa’s highest mountains, trudged through its wettest forests and drove its dusty roads. He visited isolated villages, pygmy encampments, teeming refugee settlements and thronged cities. Shot at and vilified by rebels in war zones, he experienced coup d’etats, invasions, political campaigns and elections. He chronicled political developments and gauged the ambitions of leaders. Often embraced in African hospitality, Gribbin met people in the throes of adapting traditional values to modern times. The tapestry of the complexities of modern Africa forms the backdrop for his fiction.