“Manic, mad, wild and hilarious...this is a powerful book. The author’s bipolar disorder is at first hinted at and then revealed, but this is no surprise since the very pace, audacity and honesty of the writing mirror his condition.” (Antonia Murphy, practicing psychotherapist and author of Out of this World: Suicide Examined (Karnak, 2017).

“With unvarnished honesty, Peter Bechtel weaves his experiences working in wildlife conservation in a remote area of Mozambique with his own bi-polar condition, so that the two apparently unrelated facets of his life become one. He tells his story without self-pity or self-aggrandisement.”

“Bechtel’s spare and informal writing style keeps his story moving and - despite so many trials - entertaining. Africa leaps off the page; you squint at the glare of sunset on the Indian Ocean, sweat in the muggy mid-day heat of the forest after a rain, and squirm as local villagers and first-world aid workers discuss and negotiate, but never quite communicate.”

“Bechtel leads you through his kaleidoscope world, not so much tour guide as fellow traveller, struggling as you do to make sense of it all. The journey offers new insights into the heretofore unrelated arts of living with bipolar and the conservation of wildlife.” Jenny Vaughan, author and editor (Longman Kenya, the Zimbabwe Publishing House, and the Zimbabwe Review).