School Library Journal Starred Review

Gr 6-9--For Nhamo, an 11-year-old Shona girl living in Mozambique in 1981, life is filled with the traditions of her village people. When family circumstances, a ngozi (angry spirit), and a cholera epidemic force her into a horrible marriage, she flees with only her grandmother's blessings, some gold nuggets, and many survival skills. Still, what should have been a two-day boat trip across the border to her father's family in Zimbabwe spans a year. Daily conversations with spirits help to combat her loneliness and provide her with sage and practical advice. The most incredible leg of her journey is spent on an island where Nhamo closely observes and is warily accepted by a baboon family only to have one of them destroy her shelter and food supply. She makes mistakes, loses heart, and nearly dies of starvation. Even after she arrives in Zimbabwe where she lives with scientists before meeting her father's family, Nhamo must learn to survive in civilization and exorcise the demons that haunt her. A cast of characters, glossary, background information on South Africa and the Shona, and a bibliography ground this novel's details and culture. This story is humorous and heartwrenching, complex and multilayered, and the fortunate child who reads it will place Nhamo alongside Zia (Island of the Dolphins) and Julie (Julie of the Wolves). An engrossing and memorable saga.--Susan Pine, New York Public Library

ALA Booklist

Farmer returns to Mozambique and Zimbabwe for a thick and twisting tale that follows Nhamo, a modern-day Shona girl who flees her village rather than marry a cruel man to placate an avenging spirit. Spirits are master players in this story, and to Nhamo they mean life or death. She holds frequent conversations with her dead mother, whom she visualizes by means of a torn-out magazine advertisement; and her treacherous escape by boat to Zimbabwe, where her father's family lives, is peppered with visits from water spirits, as well as the spirit of the dead man who owned her craft. Farmer marvelously evokes the narrow but hopeful atmosphere of Nhamo's existence--her pariah status in the village, her constant struggle for survival in the wilderness, and her initial difficulty in adjusting to a westernized society. Nhamo's relationships with her grandmother and cousin ring true, as do the occasionally humorous stories she tells herself in times of despair. However, the pacing of the complex story line is uneven, and many readers will be unnerved by the overflow of foreign words, which are sometimes explained in footnotes that could seem interruptive. These shortcomings, unfortunately, may limit the audience for an otherwise strong showing. Cast of characters; glossary; appendixes; bibliography. (Reviewed Sept. 1, 1996)

Horn Book

An extraordinarily rich novel set in contemporary Mozambique and Zimbabwe and featuring a most remarkable heroine begins with her life in a traditional, remote village; follows her journey to escape an arranged marriage; and concludes with her experiences in 'civilized' Zimbabwe. Farmer makes the setting real and nonexotic while incorporating information about survival techniques, Shona culture, and Zimbabwean politics. Readers will gladly accompany this courageous girl on her epic odyssey.

Kirkus Reviews

Farmer (Runnery Granary, p. 300, etc.) plunges readers deep into South African social and spiritual worlds in this tale of a Shona girl fleeing an arranged marriage. When the muvuki, the witchfinder, declares that Nhamo must marry an unsavory stranger to propitiate a murder victim's spirit, Nhamo gathers her few possessions and steals away in the village's only boat, intending to float up the Musengezi to Zimbabwe and find the father she's never known. It's a perilous journey that tests every ounce of her strength, will, and ingenuity: She has to find food in seasons fat and lean, cope with loneliness, face threats from everything from (elusive, perhaps metaphysical) leopards to land mines. Gathering discorporate (imaginary? not to her) companions as she goes, Nhamo lives in and off the wild for months, ending up at last, after finding her father's grave and enduring a cold reception from his family, with the congenial scientists at a tsetse fly research station. Although Farmer describes the history and culture of the Shona and other groups in an afterword, she hardly needs to; the cultural backdrop is so skillfully developed in her protagonist's experiences and responses that it will seem as understandable—or, in the case of European and Christian practices, as strange—and immediate to readers as it is to Nhamo. This wonderfully resourceful young woman is surrounded by an equally lively, colorful cast, and by removing many of the borders between human and animal, living and dead, Farmer creates a milieu as vivid and credible as readers' own. As rewarding, and as challenging, as The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm (1994). (glossary, appendix, bibliography) (Fiction. 11-14)"

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

This 1997 Newbery Honor book, which is set in Africa, is both a survival story and a spiritual voyage. """"[The heroine] is a stunning creation--while she serves as a fictional ambassador from a foreign culture, she is supremely human. An unforgettable work,"""" said PW in a starred review. Ages 10-14. (Mar.)