Sibanda And The Rainbird

Description

The story opens with the discovery of a gruesomely vulture-mutilated corpse in the Park near Thunduluka Lodge. Sibanda comes to the conclusion that the victim has been murdered for body parts. Clues include: tyre tracks, a knife inscribed with the letter 'B', and a sliver of blue metallic car paint, all of which lead Sibanda on several fraught journeys in search of the distinctive vehicle.

With Sibanda are his sidekicks: Sergeant Ncube an overweight, digestively challenged, severally married angler and mechanical genius; and Miss Daisy an ancient, truculent and eccentric Land Rover that is the bane of Sibanda's life and the love of Ncube's. But the Bush, Detective Sibanda's passion for it and encyclopaedic knowledge of it are characters as much as the comic Ncube and his loveable Miss Daisy.

This is a gentle tale, with brush strokes of violence, which touches on several themes and encompasses history, politics, brutality in war and marriage, betrayal and greed. There's plenty of bush adventure and natural history, disparate characters and friction as they pursue the clues in an unreliable Land Rover.

About the Author
C.M. Elliottwas born in England in 1950 and, at 17, immigrated to Australia where she completed an Honours degree in French Studies at the University of Western Australia. Elliott moved to Zimbabwe in 1977 (in the middle of the civil war) and, with her game ranger husband, pioneered a tourism business in the newly independent country, based in and around Hwange National Park. Elliott began writing seriously about three years ago short stories to begin with and then moving on to what would eventually become Sibanda and the Rainbird. She now writes fulltime with the bit between her teeth.