Genre: Realistic
Published: 1998
Personal rating: 3/5
Yearly count: 72
Rules of the wild tells the story of Esme, an Italian immigrant now living in Kenya, and her struggle to fit in there, to find herself, and the love she feels for two very different men. The fact that the author herself is also an Italian now living in Kenya shows and brings the descriptions in the book to life. The writing style did take me a while to get into, but once I got used to it, it was fine. The ending, while not the happy ending I was hoping for, felt hopeful even if it was ambiguous and fit the tone of the story. So despite it not being a fairy-tale ending, I ended up liking it quite a lot.
However, a lot of the story is about looking back, and Esme reflecting on her life and how things all went wrong. Esme is a fairly passive character and that combined with the lack of forward movement in the story made the whole book feel very passive. I didn’t like that very much.
All in all, this was an ok book. It didn’t shine for me, although the immigrant lifestyle was very well depicted, as were all the different aspects of Africa. That, for me, made the book more worth reading than the whole story about Esme.
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