Men of Men: The Ballantyne Series 2

This is a good example of a wonderful story-teller using actual and contrived history to produce a superb tale. Is it exciting, sophisticated, challenging, and charming? Yes!!. Is it accurate? The people who know Africa would say "No". I am moderately familiar with the land. Would I read his writings? Yes??

First off, don't read this before its predecessor, "A Falcon Flies." All characters here are introduced in that book, the first of a four-book series on the Ballantynes. The first book is about the African slave trade, thickly larded with much sex and violence. This one's a bit better-- it follows lead character Zouga Ballantyne to the diamond fields of Kimberly, where he swears to make his fortune. We meet his sons and follow their adventures as well-- the book is best when it looks at the African tribes that must deal with white encroachment in the latter part of the 19th century. Smith writes gritty adventures/soap operas that entertain and inform, and while this one is good, it's not quite up to the standards of the Courtney novels, beginning with "Birds of Prey." Read that one first; if it piques your interest, you'll want to read the next 11 books in that series, then come back to try the Ballantynes....

The saying goes that no one should take themselves too seriously. Wilbur Smith has gone off the edge.
He creates a bizarre world where the men are awesome, fearless in danger but wimps when it comes to women The men are often strong but the women are super. He has a fascination with women; he is like an articulate love struck school boy.
Zouga Ballantyne wastes his life and that of his wife and sons in pursuing a diamond mine. Zouga is convinced he can strike it rich and fails miserably. Zouga is the father of one normal lad and one super effeminate boy who considers self-castration. When the older son is found to have visited a prostitute, Zouga, all full of self-righteous pride scolds then beats him. This is the same Zouga who is later smitten with another man's wife who is a fraud. The book breathlessly describes this woman as a goddess and expert horsewoman who just happens to be half Native American, daughter of an Indian Chief too, (yeah right. This continues the romantic fascination that some Caucasian people have with native Americans: "they are a mystical people in touch with nature and natural born horse riders") When this woman tricks him into losing a horse race, by playing upon his sympathy, Zouga is such a sap he doesn't fault her. He just accepts the loss of his diamond mine and later cheerfully decides to help her and her lousy husband escape town.
Said Indian Princess will shoot a lion, and survive being lost in the desert until love struck Zouga finds her. Only then can he nurse her back to health and he can marry her. And when it comes time for the real blood letting, two new characters are introduced to kill the Matabele priestess; excusing Zouga from the atrocity and painting them as evil from which his actions are held higher. All very proper and all very absurd.
We meet Robyn Ballantyne who has single handedly crusaded against the slave trade between Africa and America and has retired to an African outpost where she is the local doctor / surgeon. And she reads classical Greek medical books too. Does anyone accept the hyperbole? Then somehow this woman is reunited with the man who terrorized her, (raped her? we aren't sure) then she mends his wounds only to later have him cause her husband's death. When he reports her husband's death he finishes the job and rapes her again; or does he? She is described as hating him but wanting him with such a passion. Shades of gothic romance! Guess what? He impregnates her too; guess you saw that coming right?
Cecil Rhodes is described as brilliant scholar who pines to read the original sources Mr. Gibbons read in his book on the Romans, What? Huh? Rhodes is an ambitious loner who thinks nothing of slaughtering the native Matabeles and stealing their land. He is a symbol not a human and his sexuality is questioned with the effeminate son of Zouga.

Smith has also become an apologist for British Imperialism and genocide in Africa. In this book there is no remorse for the death and destruction the whites pursue against the Africans. Without apology they connive a way to wage war against the Matabeles and then wipe out thousands of these people. Black comedian Godfrey Cambridge said, "In South Africa when the Zulus killed a dozen British soldiers it's called a massacre. When the British killed a thousand Zulus it's called a battle." When a group of British soldiers are killed we are led to feel for them but when hundreds of Matabele warriors are mowed down with a gattling gun we just yawn and turn the page.
Aside from all this the book is drawn out; too slowly paced.