book cover The cover of Khaki Fever by Lindsay Norman.
Image: supplied
Khaki Fever
Lindsay Norman
Jonathan Ball
Review: Lauren O’Connor-May
This book defies easy genre classification, blending adventure with women's fiction in a distinctly South African setting.
The quick, fast-paced read tells the story of twenty-something Alex, a socially awkward game guide with no filter. Her outbursts to guests cost her her job and reputation, so she goes home to her wealthy family in Constantia, where she creates a male alias and applies for work with a mangling of her real name.
She gets a job at an exclusive game reserve in Mpumalanga, so she runs away from her family and heads to the lodge with trouble dogging her footsteps, literally. At the lodge, Alex compounds her lies with a few more white ones while she quietly develops an attraction to the sexy head guide.
Everything comes to a boil when Alex’s unabashed unspokenness prompts the beleaguered owner’s jealous, influencer girlfriend to seek revenge.
This book was a fun, quick read with a solid dose of South Africanness. Some of the characters lacked development, though, and this might have been avoided if the readers had been made privy to the conversations and heart-to-hearts that are only described in passing.
The lack of development leaves the characters looking caricaturish. I think the novel would have benefitted if it had been made slightly longer so that the characters could have had room to develop.
You will enjoy this book if you like quick, easy, adventure reads that are super low on spice.