Back to the Bush - James Hendry

Back To The Bush: Another Year In The Wild is the tale of a second year at Sasekile Private Game Reserve for Angus MacNaughton, his brother Hugh and the melange of outlandish characters who staff and visit the lodge. Angus's weekly journal recounts a positive beginning to the year for the MacNaughton brothers: fastidious Hugh is in love, running his own camp and on the verge of a promotion. Angus is involved in a romantic liaison, which takes the edge off his customary cynicism, and for the first time in their adult lives, a positive fraternal bond exists between them. Inevitably, reality comes calling. Angus's love affair ends and he copes poorly, Hugh becomes stratospherically arrogant on the back of a promotion and Julia, the MacNaughtons' sister, starts dating Angus's nemesis - Alistair 'The Legend' Jones. Then there are a series of further 'hiccups', from demanding lodge guests and marauding monkeys, to a labour protest, a run-in with a blind-drunk head chef, a winter drought, a rogue elephant that puts staff and guests in danger and the resignation of the sterling head ranger.