A greater escape

We find many great escapes in movies and novels, including The Great Escape, The Shawshank Redemption, Escape from Alcatraz, Papillon and others. But none of those escapees had to walk across a thousand miles of the Kalahari Desert.

Laurens van der Post's stirring 1974 novel A Far Off Place is a sequel to A Story Like the Wind, which concludes with the massacre by Communist-led rebels of everyone living in the vicinity of an African farm called Hunter's Drift except for two teenagers and two Bushmen.

The killers don't know about the Bushmen, Xhabbo and his wife Nuin-Tara, or Nonnie, the girl who had just arrived at Hunter's Drift to join her family, but they do know that Francois somehow escaped death along with his dog Hintza and they must find him before he can report the massacre. And so the chase is on.

Francois may be young, but he is resourceful, having grown up in Africa, and incredibly brave. The Bushmen have lived in the desert all their lives and know how to find food and water where there appears to be none. The weak link is Nonnie, whose surprising strength and endurance make their escape possible.

One adventure follows another, even after their pursuers give up the chase. The final challenge comes when both Nonnie and Xhabbo contract sleeping sickness and have only weeks to live unless they can find help.

Van der Post writes beautifully, although his beautiful language sometimes does have a tendency to slow down the action.