The Last Resort: A Memoir of Mischief and Mayhem on a Family Farm in Africa

By Douglas Rogers

Book Overview

Thrilling, heartbreaking, and, at times, absurdly funny, The Last Resort is a remarkable true story about one family in a country under siege and a testament to the love, perseverance, and resilience of the human spirit.

Born and raised in Zimbabwe, Douglas Rogers is the son of white farmers living through that country's long and tense transition from postcolonial rule. He escaped the dull future mapped out for him by his parents for one of adventure and excitement in Europe and the United States. But when Zimbabwe's president Robert Mugabe launched his violent program to reclaim white-owned land and Rogers's parents were caught in the cross fire, everything changed. Lyn and Ros, the owners of Drifters-a famous game farm and backpacker lodge in the eastern mountains that was one of the most popular budget resorts in the country-found their home and resort under siege, their friends and neighbors expelled, and their lives in danger. But instead of leaving, as their son pleads with them to do, they haul out a shotgun and decide to stay.

On returning to the country of his birth, Rogers finds his once orderly and progressive home transformed into something resembling a Marx Brothers romp crossed with Heart of Darkness pot has supplanted maize in the fields; hookers have replaced college kids as guests; and soldiers, spies, and teenage diamond dealers guzzle beer at the bar.

And yet, in spite of it all, Rogers's parents-with the help of friends, farmworkers, lodge guests, and residents-among them black political dissidents and white refugee farmers-continue to hold on. But can they survive to the end?

In the midst of a nation stuck between its stubborn past and an impatient future, Rogers soon begins to see his parents in a new light: unbowed, with passions and purpose renewed, even heroic. And, in the process, he learns that the "big story" he had relentlessly pursued his entire adult life as a roving journalist and travel writer was actually happening in his own backyard.

Evoking elements of The Tender Bar and Absurdistan, The Last Resort is an inspiring, coming-of-age tale about home, love, hope, responsibility, and redemption. An edgy, roller-coaster adventure, it is also a deeply moving story about how to survive a corrupt Third World dictatorship with a little innovation, humor, bribery, and brothel management.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0307407985
• ISBN13: 9780307407986
• Release Date: September 2010
• Publisher: Crown Publishing Group (NY)
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.1" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

Fabulous book!

You're instantly transported into the world of The Drifters, the backpacking resort in Zimbabwe and the very real dangers posed by the encroaching Mugabe dictatorship.

Your adrenaline will flow

This book will get your adrenaline flowing. I received it as a Christmas gift, and I figured it would be light reading somewhere down the line. On the day after Christmas, I opened the book to read a few pages, and continued reading until I finished it! It was a cliffhanger, and all true, and I had to know what happened next. The innocent frog on the cover does not give any indication of what you're in for once you start . I traveled through Zimbabwe on separate trips years ago, once by train and the second time by hitchhiking. It is a beautiful country with great people, and it has been difficult to watch the country deteriorate into a quagmire. So it was really an uplifting experience to see how the author's parents and other people have survived draconian measures. It is really a testament to the human spirit. You will thoroughly enjoy this book. Within a few pages, you will be drawn in and you will find it hard to stop. You'll feel that you are right there with the Rogers family and their lodge. It's truly a fascinating story.

A great read

I was able to read an advanced copy and I really enjoyed it. It is an easy read and a remarkable story of the author's family in Zimbabwe. His family lineage goes back 300 years on the African Continent. His family is one of the last white land owners in Zimbabwe and the story is of his immediate family living through the transitions from Rhodesia to Zimbabwe to the last 10 years of "Land Reform". His parents ran a well regarded backpacker lodge in the eastern mountains of Zimbabwe all through the 1990's. In the last decade, despite inflation in the million percent range, as well as brutal and murderous land seizures, his parents are still miraculously on "their" land. It is their LAST RESORT! Douglas Rogers is quite the raconteur. His writing makes you ache to visit and see for your self the raw and natural beauty that is Zimbabwe. I recommend this book.

the Great North Road leads to New York

Buy Douglas' "bleddy book." He paints breath-taking pictures. I didn't know where Mutare was. I thought it was the old name for Umtata (South Africa). Just reading the first few pages reminded me of my travels through Zimbabwe in 1960 on the Great North Road. Douglas' ability to describe the smells, sounds, ugliness and extraordinary beauty of that part of Africa is special. The meaningful values developed from his parents and from growing up in Southern Africa is palpable. And I have only read the first chapter of Douglas' truly inspirational book.