Suzanne Arruda

American Jade del Cameron served as an ambulance driver in France in the Great War and saw her love, pilot David Worthy, get shot down. She vowed to fulfill his dying wish that she find his unknown half-brother. That vow takes her to Nairobi in 1919, where David 19s father died years earlier when he was attacked by a hyena in his hotel. She takes a job as a journalist for The Traveler magazine and infiltrates the Happy Valley set, where she makes friends and organizes a safari.

As Jade makes her way through African society, an American made uncomfortable by the strictures of class and race, she learns Swahili, moves to a coffee plantation, and navigates the rutted roads of Africa in an unreliable car. There have been some suspicious deaths and not just that of David Worthy's father. The natives believe that a laibon is at work, an evil spirit who has the ability to assume the form of a beast, in this case a hyena. Or a lion. Or are there two laibons at work? Jade isn't sure she believes this, but isn't as quick to rule out the possibility as some of her compatriots.

Jade is a forthright, blunt-spoken, action-oriented heroine who knows more about guns than fashion. Clips from her travel articles head up each chapter and the action moves swiftly through bush and ballroom until it culminates in a sufficiently atmospheric and danger-riddled safari. I was intrigued enough with this first book to pick up the second one. I thought Jade was lots of fun, even if she may be too good to be true.… (meer)

Stalking Ivory is the second book in the Jade del Cameron series, set in Africa in the 1920s. She explores Africa with her camera and writes a for the Traveler Magazine. Jade's current assignment is to photograph elephants in the Mount Marsabit area of Kenya. Jade has also promised the chief game warden that she’ll be on the lookout for ivory poachers in the area. Even though elephants aren’t yet endangered animals they are preyed on by ivory poachers who brutally slaughter whole herds. Not only does Jade find poachers, she also has to deal with slave trading, gun running, and murder.

I thought the mystery was very well constructed. The secondary characters are quite interesting, especially Jelani, the young boy Jade is determined to help. He also travels along with Jade, babysitting her pet cheetah, Biscuit. Sometimes the main character can be a bit unrealistic. Nevertheless, this is a series I often read when looking for an escapist read.
… (meer)