About the Book

1953: An armed uprising in Kenya tears apart the fabric of the country. Marissa Stewart, an American teenager attending a boarding school in the midst of the conflict, sets out to escape the trauma. Her story becomes a hair-raising tale of terror, elopement with author John Dupre, and flight across the face of Africa in search of something just out of reach. Yet she ends up losing everything she holds dear.

2000: Dying and alone in Paris, Marissa asks freelance journalist Charlotte McConnell to write about John’s last years of life, which quickly becomes her own story. At first reluctant, Charlotte finds herself caught in the drama and her own life is changed completely.

About the Author

Joyce Baker Porte is the author of The Tanganyika Trilogy and a collection of short stories titled Stormbird of the Serengeti. Her early years and schooling coincided with some of the events chronicled in this novel.

She says, “My childhood was spent in Africa, where my parents were missionaries in Tanganyika. My home became Marissa’s home; my family cook (now deceased) became Marissa’s; her school in Kenya was mine; the attack on the school happened while I was there. After I graduated from the school in Kenya, I came back to the USA for college.” She presently lives with her husband in Alaska, where she is a real estate broker.