"The Last Resort: A Memoir of Zimbabwe" by Douglas Rogers

The Last Resort is a dark, comic, true-life thriller about Lyn and Ros Rogers, white Africans of many generations, struggling to hold on to their game farm and backpacker lodge in Robert Mugabe's war-torn Zimbabwe. Travel writer Douglas Rogers returns to the family farm from his home in Brooklyn, New York to discover that marijuana is growing instead of maize; prostitutes, diamond dealers, and refugee farmers prop up the lodge bar, and war veterans and youth militia loyal to Mugabe hover outside the gates.
In going back Rogers discovers the "big story" he had traveled the world in search of is taking place in his parents' back yard.
Evoking elements of The Tender Bar and Absurdistan, The Last Resort is an inspiring coming-of-age tale about home, love, hope, responsibility and redemption. An edgy roller-coaster adventure, it is also a deeply moving story about how to survive a corrupt Third World dictatorship with a little innovation, humor, bribery, and brothel management. [src.: facebook group]

UPDATE: check the interview with Douglas Rogers in "The New Yorker"! (17 Dec 2009)

get the book in the TravelComments.com eShop >>
Zimbabwe country guide >>