Book description
When she is eleven years old, Martine is orphaned and sent to live with
her grandmother on a game reserve in South Africa. Her grandmother seems
strangely unwelcoming and Martine has a difficult time settling in at
her new school, where she is conspicuously an outsider. But she has an
ally in Tendai - one of the keepers on the reserve, from whom she learns
the lore and survival techniques of the bush, and in Grace - who
instantly senses there is something special about Martine. There are
secrets about Sawubona (the reserve) just waiting to be revealed, and
rumours too about a fabled white giraffe - a trophy for hunters
everywhere. One night Martine, lonely and feeling slightly rebellious
too, looks out of her window and see a young albino giraffe - silver,
tinged with cinnamon in the moonlight. This is the beginning of her
mysterious and magical adventures - her discovery of her gift of healing
and a secret valley that she travels to with the giraffe, where she'll
find clues about her past and future. Above all it's is a heart-warming
story, full of charm and atmosphere, and Martine's sheer delight in her
giraffe friend and the fantastic landscape which is theirs to explore.
Lauren St John was born in Gatooma, Rhodesia, now Kadoma, Zimbabwe. At
11, she and her family moved to Rainbow's End farm and game reserve, the
subject of her acclaimed memoir, and she grew up surrounded by animals,
including eight horses, two warthogs and a pet giraffe. After nearly a
decade as golf correspondent to The Sunday Times, followed by a sojourn
in the US, riding the tour buses of alt. country stars like Emmylou
Harris, Steve Earle and the Dixie Chicks, she wrote the bestselling
'White Giraffe' series. 'Dead Man's Cove', the first in her new mystery
series about 11-year-old detective, Laura Marlin, won the 2011 Blue
Peter Favourite Story and Book of the Year Awards.
