Rating: 
Summary: This is a really good book
Review: That's what it is. It doesn't "conflate a particular white settler Rhodesian childhood with African somehow," ...and there is no "vapid attempt at shock value by constantly mentioning the word pee,"...The problem with a democratic review system is that it's democratic. This is vivid storytelling, emotionally honest and detailed. It's a history of a certain period only incidentally; it's what happened to this person, in this family, in this place, at this time... Take it for what it is-- a great, strange, and vivid memoir.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful
Review: I loved this book. I thought it was a beautiful, unapologetic look at life growing up in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe. Some readers have complained about how she jumps around. This is true - it is not linear. But the progression makes sense. It is as if she is telling us her life story. If you were telling someone your story, you would invariably jump around as one thing you say causes you to think of another. I felt that this created a sense of intimacy. A note about some of the negative reviews: some readers have suggested alternative black Zimbabwean authors instead. Others have complained that the voice of the native people is left out. This is Alexandra's voice. While I am sure there are plenty of great Zimbabwean authors, they could not have told this story. I found it remarkable.
Rating: 
Summary: A Shocking, Vivid Memoir
Review: Written as a series of stream-of-concsiousness stand-alone essays, but organized in a linear fashion, covering the period of time from the author's birth, through her marriage. I live in Africa, which makes me appreciate the author's descriptions even more. I have traveled extensively in both southern and central Africa, although I've never been to the locations described in the book. Her descriptions are extremely vivid-after reading this book, I feel that I've been to these places, and experienced her life with her. Nevertheless, I found her young life shocking in many ways. The book also helped me understand the current political climate of Zimbabwe today, and the origin of why the blacks are dispossing the white farmers today. A very good book.
Rating:
Summary: another whenwe's view
Review: As an ex Rhodesian, also known as a when-we, I was very hesitant about reading this book... too much memory, too much pain and way too much longing for home.. But I bought it, and I loved it, I cried my eyes out, so much seemed to have been taken from my own past. Well done Ms. Fuller... I recomend this book as the best book I've read in years.
Rating:
Summary: Compelling. A story you will want to devour.
Review: There are currently 266 other reviews of this book available here, so I won't waste time revisiting the plot. The author tells her story in first person, with the insight and "wisdom" of the child she is throughout most of this book. The realities for her include terrorism, alcoholism, depression, racism, death. But through it all is the love of family, strength of character, and the background of a very real Africa that few of us could ever know. Although the chronology is jumbled at first, the reader can quickly acclimate to the unusual flow of the dialogue and novel. But it is for this reason that I give it 4, not 5 stars. It certainly is a book that left me wishing for a sequel.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful and profound
Review: 'An African Childhood" is a searing, soulful look at an extraordinary childhood. When I first approached this book, I hesitated. My boook club was reading it and I had considered skipping that night. However, the blurbs on the inside convinced me to give it a try.
I am so glad that I did. I read it in one sitting. Fuller's book haunted me. Her description of the imperialistic and racist attitudes of her parents was deeply frightening to me as the book took place in the 1970's and the 1980's. Yes we all know of British colonial attitudes in India and the Raj and the like-but that seemed so far away, so pre-World War II. In this book, you realize that such attitudes are barely a decade away.
In addition, Fuller made you feel the landscape of Africa. I couldn't live there-I doubt that I would have survived a year of her childhood. Yet as she writes and writes about the aching beauty of the land, you realize that for some people, no other continent will ever suffice.
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Summary: This book inspired me...
Review: Ask me how Zimbabwe smells in the dead of night and how Zambezi mud porridge really tastes. Ask me what chimurenga means. I could tell you but not because I'm from Africa. This book took me there. It's full of secrets and stories and moments bursting with life. All the stuff that songs are made of... ... hear the song inspired by this book!
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Summary: No apologies, no excuses
Review: Do you know how sometimes, when people write memoirs, they write their childhood as if they were wise and had the perspective they have now, then? And how people tend to gloss over the faults and idiosyncracies of their family members, or, worse yet, magnify and dwell on them for effect? Alexandra Fuller does neither. She presents us with a picture of a real family living in 'interesting times'. She makes no excuses for her parents' obvious prejudice, and somehow, despite it, I found myself liking them. Read this book if you like reading non-fiction and/or memoirs. Or if you have an interest in recent (well... in the last 30 years, anyway) African history.
Rating:
Summary: Couldn't put this one down!
Review: Great book, very interesting and attention-holding. Although some parts were confusing and the writer's style is a bit "jumpy", late in the book you realize the chapters are scenes from her life, in chronological order, but not necessarily connected. I would recommend this book though as it depicts a life most unlike most people's.
Rating:
Summary: --Candid and Unforgetable--
Review: Alexandra Fuller takes us back during the years 1972 to 1990 into the life that she led as a child in Southern and Central Africa. Her words are painful and hilarious, but always ring truthful. The story of her very determined parents and the struggle the entire family experienced is amazing. These parents are not the hand holding gentle souls who can't bear to worry their children, they are blunt and strong and serve as examples of people who are surviving in a very difficult life and often-brutal country. The family lived on several farms trying to make a living on inhospitable land where guerrilla fighters were lurking in the bushes and camping on the farmland during the nights. The truth was they loved Africa, and were determined to stay there. During all of the years of civil unrest, her father was often away serving as a soldier for the government. Her mother was a very emotional, but strong woman who tried her best to hold on even when she saw her children die and she had to continue to run the farm alone while her husband was out fighting. Everyone carried guns and the children were taught how to load a gun as soon as they were agile enough to do it. Alexandra, called Bobo by her family gives us this remembrance that she had from the age of three. 'Mum says, 'Don't come creeping into our room at night.' They sleep with loaded guns beside them on the bedside rugs. She says, 'Don't startle us when we're sleeping.' 'We might shoot you.' 'Oh.' ' By mistake.' 'Okay, I won't.' replied Bobo. I didn't want this story to end and hope that the author writes another book and gives us an update on her remarkable family.
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