Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an electronic copy to read in exchange for an honest review.

I'll admit it was a bit difficult to get into this book. There are a lot of characters and the e-ARC made it hard to follow when there was a switch between characters. That being said, once I got into the rhythm of the book and the story I was hooked! This reads like a more modern Wilbur Smith book. Be warned - you will go down rabbit holes of rhino hunting, South African politics, and apartheid. And you will love it

The Rhino Conspiracy by Peter Hain.
This book really appealed to me. Unfortunately I struggled to get into it as it was very heavy with politics and ANC history. However I kept reading and ultimately enjoyed this book.
It’s 2 main stories are very topical. It mixes environmental concerns regarding poaching of elephants and rhinos with politics and history concerning the greed and corruption of the South African government.
This book is a must for anyone interested in South African history or in protecting the environment.

This book was a little different to what i usually read, so I dont think I am the intended market for this book. But overall I did enjoy it. I found the multiple points of view really kept the read interesting. Although, it was not always easy to keep track of who was who.
The book did take me a long time to get into as I didnt find the characters particularly compelling. But the storyline and topics were interesting and the setting was brilliantly different compared to my usual reads. Like I said, this isnt my usual genre but if you are open to a thriller with some international politics a side of animal conservation in an interesting setting, give it a go.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It was a great thriller and the way in which it was written made it really easily readable.

I will confess to finding this book tough going. Clearly the author has spent endless hours researching South African history and the events that have shaped the country. However rather than adding to the storyline or creating background, historical paragraphs felt weighty and included so as not to see good research wasted. This is a book that keeps trodding along like a rhino, but lacking much of a charge. Thank you NetGalley for the reader copy of this book.

My passion for African wildlife attracted me to this book. I discovered the beauty of the African bush years ago and I am addicted to it ever since. Going out into the bush early morning or late afternoon, breathing the scent of the ground, plants and life, and admiring the beautiful wildlife is an amazing experience I am very grateful to have had many times.
This book starts with this side of the story, with visitors in a game reserve admiring the animals. The book expresses beautifully the author's love for his country of birth, and it is also a very good thriller that takes us to the more complex side of the country. Behind the beauty of the place, there is a real drama that is taking place with the considerable damage caused by poaching. In the case of rhinos, the poaching has caused the near extinction of the species. Behind this drama is a link to the political situation in the country, the corruption, state capture and the complexities of the political and human history of South Africa during and since the Apartheid.
The heroes of this book embark into a risky adventure in their determination to reveal the networks that benefit from poaching, all the way up to the top of the country's power elite. The characters in the book are interesting and driven. They have been created on the basis of actual persons known to the author, but fictionalised and they have even sometime been given very neutral names like the Sniper, the Ranger, the Owner, the Veteran, the MP (reminiscent of the author himself and the positions he took against apartheid) etc. Still, we can feel the emotion that motivates their actions and it gives an interesting perspective on the politics, the culture and the situation in South Africa, all topics on which there is so much to learn, especially for those who are not familiar with all the details of the South African political landscape.
The book is, beyond the thriller, a strong message about the need to protect the environment and all the challenges that are involved in succeeding to do so. It is also a message of hope for future generations which our heroes Thandi Matjeke and Isaac Mkhize carry to the end.
I have really enjoyed this excellent book. I thought the thriller was well written and I learned a lot while reading it.

Thank you to Netgalley, to Muswell Press and Peter Hain, for giving me the pleasure to read this book with an advance readers' copy.

Hain takes on the subject of rhino poaching in South Africa. He also takes on subjects such as corruption in the government, providing a rather detailed history of the government prior to and since the end of apartheid. While he tells his story passionately, he tells it in great detail, often too much detail. In contrast with Michael Stanley's Shoot the Bastards,The Rhino Conspiracy presents many more facts but is a much more difficult - and much longer - read. The first part of the book, in which Hain introduces many characters, can be a bit confusing. Yet the book will reward readers who hang in there until the end.

I just couldn't wait to get my hands on this book because the subject of rhino poaching is so important to me as a field researcher. Finally a THRILLER about this heartbreaking and overlooked topic!

My personal bias aside, the plot in this book is just really good. It is set at a wildlife park in South Africa which has been the target of relentless poachers. However, fighting them is no easy task, given the sheer power and wealth behind this disgusting and illegal trade. The plot focuses on the people trying to understand the ways of poachers from a close perspective in order to take action; however, the way Peter Hain has approached this is highly political (poaching practices and moguls, taxes, corruption, weaponry, oil, supply chain). I think it was a very ambitious way of writing, but also highly complex - perhaps if I wasn't already so invested in this subject, I would get confused about the various relationships.

In additions, the characters were not a strong suit of The Rhino Conspiracy as I was sometimes getting confused who's who. Nonetheless, I really enjoyed this mystery/thriller because it's as informative as it is entertaining.

*Thank you to the Publisher for a free advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Good thriller that highlights South African dodgy politics that this author clearly has years of experience in covering with his history. A rousing yarn that at times tends to be a touch preachy as it veers off plot but then gets back on track. Beautiful descriptions of wildlife and the battle against poaching all backed by a criminal administration, sadly a true fact in much of the dark continent but still a worthy tale to stand alongside the likes of Wilbur Smith.

A MUST read if interested in saving rhinos & elephants.

Isaac Mkhize is a committed, conservationist working at Zama Zama Game Lodge near Richards Bay. He loves teaching the visitors who come to stay in this idyllic private game reserve about all the animals that roam the park. He’s incredibly passionate about the rhinos, always guarded by trained security guards armed with rifles to protect these prehistoric lumbering beasts from poachers who will arrive – usually in the dead of night with AK47s and pangas to kill the rhinos and then hack out their horns. Unfortunately, no matter how much people in places like Vietnam or China are told by experts that the horn contains nothing more than what standard human nails comprise, these horns are considered to be the cure for everything from cancer to infertility and impotence.

Isaac is uneasy with one of the new visitors, Piet van der Merwe. He keeps asking far too many probing questions about rhinos. His instinct is that they are not merely questions being asked by someone genuinely interested but someone who might have a hidden agenda.

With this same group is a beautiful young girl, Thandi Matjeke. She’d won a competition giving her this once in a lifetime chance to visit the game lodge. Isaac is fascinated by not just her beauty but her brains and vows to get to know her better. Little does he know how she will change his life.

The veteran – lives a quiet life in the beautiful Cape Peninsula harbour town of Kalk Bay. He’d spent years on Robben Island and was one of Nelson Mandela’s original members of parliament. He hates the direction his beloved ANC government is going under the present president. Corruption is the new law of the land. He hates that this president is lining his pockets. The people who fought for the ANC are being neglected. Houses are not being built, and water and electricity are scarce for the masses who live in squatter camps.

He decides to speak out against the president, knowing that this will put a target on his back. Thandi persuades Isaac to accompany her to a meeting that the veteran addresses and insists on meeting him after the meeting. He immediately sees that both Thandi and Isaac have the potential to help him fight the unjust behaviour of the president.

The owner of Zama Zama is devastated when a rhino is slaughtered. Isaac is equally disgusted, and they decide that action must be taken to stop the attacks from being repeated, but how? After much discussion, they come up with a plan, and the sniper is summoned to help.

As a South African now living in the UK, I’m still passionate about the country and like every other South African have watched with horror as the country has seemingly crashed and burnt under the presidency of Zuma and his alliance with the Gupta brothers. What Peter Hain has achieved with this novel, based on the truth and known events is explained how interlinked rhino horns and ivory have become for lining the pockets of those in power.

Peter Hain has managed through his writing to explain to us, (possibly not knowing the intricate ins and outs of how corruption has taken over every aspect of life). He’s drawn a picture using the game lodge as the backdrop of how people like the Boere mafia, Taiwanese, and government ministers and their minions have become billionaires while leaving places and industries bankrupted and ruined.

Bravo Peter Hain and thank you. If you want to find out more about how game parks are fighting the rhino wars, read this book. If you want to hear how people survived on Robben Island, read this book. If you want to know how South Africa has sunk to junk status, read this book. If you want to meet superb well-defined characters, read this book.

Rony

Elite Reviewing Group received a copy of the book to review.

I went out of my comfort zone for this book but I did struggle with the content and the storyline. I can imagine if this is the sort of thing you’re interested in and know a little about, it would be a great read.

".....a new black governing elite had replaced the white one," states Peter Hain in this excellent thriller set amongst the game reserves and political corruption of South Africa. I'm sure Hain must have done a considerable amount of research into the intricacies of rhino poaching but he only has his own experiences in which to write about the huge political changes seen in South Africa where he was originally born.
It was nice to see a passing mention of his mother (Adelaine Hain)as one of the smaller 'veteran' activists because Hain's parents were vocal anti apartheid protestors and were imprisoned and banned from speaking against the then white dominated regime. After coming to the UK Hain as a teenager became involved in protests himself famously outside the South African Embassy for years in London and with the growing public awareness of protest supporting Nelson Mandela.
But Hain does not have rose tinted glasses about South Africa. His glory is in the original fight and of the country itself where the landscape is beautifully described alongside the game reserves where locals are fighting to protect (amongst many other species) the increasingly threatened rhinos. Poaching is now an international trade seeking (especially in Asian markets) the prized rhino horn for traditional medicines, tonics and high end gifts and investments. The rangers try to guard the prized creatures (my favourite character was Isaac Mkhize in charge at the Zama Zama reserve) but locals wanting to supplement their meagre incomes are often backed by international traders or, as in this story the South African government seeking to make money themselves by selling rhino horn abroad.
Hain is at his best with the character of the Veteran, linked with Mandela from the past but now wanting to overturn the increasingly corrupt South African President and ANC. The link with a sympathetic British MP who helps to expose the issues was a clever ploy to perhaps show us Hain's long life passionate work against many issues that brought him also into being a target (with the security forces and wit threats and bombs)
The high level of killing is shocking perhaps as human bodies stack up to save the rhinos but this is a murky business and includes countries we often assume will kill themselves in pursuit of power and money (China and Russia particularly). I am sure the book will raise a few eyebrows and will once again put Hain in the eye of a storm about seeking to condemn South African politics when he had fought so hard to overturn the whites and see Mandela in power alongside the first open elections for the blacks. Many question whether Mandela's personality obscured his ability to see how many around him abused the system (even his own ex wife Winnie) and that the famous 'Rainbow Nation' was little more than a short charade for back to corrupt business now in the hands of the ANC. Having once been privileged to sit in a hall and hear Nelson Mandela speak I can assure you of his presence and oratory but I do think if he were here today he also would be alongside Hain in raising in a high profile the threats to the rhino, the insidious corruption with money alongside power and the still unchecked and vile AIDs alongside rape threats to so many girls and women across his beloved South Africa.
Lots to learn. Sometimes the plot drifts but there is a spectacular finale and a great female character young Thandi to inspire people for a better future.

this was a really enjoyable read, the characters were great and I really enjoyed figuring out what was happening in this mystery.

I wanted to enjoy this book a whole lot more than I did. Truthfully, it was a struggle because there are far too many words used to tell an excellent story. The book needs to edited down by at least a third. My other major complaint is that the characters were not fully fleshed out and it was difficult, or impossible, to feel any connection with most of them. There was no background on any of them, and very little exploration of their personalities beyond describing the present moment. Worse still was the author's use of Job Descriptions - the Sniper, the Owner, the Veteran, the President, etc - as characters which made them cardboard cutouts in the story. Since most of these were major actors in the plot, this really was unforgivable. It took me nearly half of the book to realize that Mandiba and Mandela were the same person. As I said earlier, there is a really good book somewhere in all of those words. A good editor could bring it out fairly quickly.

‘The Rhino Conspiracy’ by Peter Hain is a keen and unusual political thriller, exposing the illegal trade of rhinos against a background of political corruption in South Africa. Initially, there are several different strands; first we meet ‘The Veteran’, a former veteran of the fight for freedom, breaks from the ANC in order to confront the corruption that is rife is his beloved homeland. Meanwhile, we learn of Zama Zama, a new wildlife refugee, where we meet Thandi, and Mkhize, who will form an alliance with The Veteran to fight against the poaching as one element of the corruption.
There is a strong and timely plot, mixing both fact and fiction as we learn about the early fays of the ANC and the anti-apartheid struggle, featuring such well-known heroes as Nelson Mandela. It can become somewhat difficult to keep track of the different strands but it is worthwhile sticking with the storyline of this enjoyable thriller.

I really wasn't sure what to expect when picking up this book. A book about Rhino poaching? Government conspiracies? A story about conservation and the ultimate disaster that our planet is heading towards if we do not finally sit up and take note? Well ... yes. It was al of those things but so much more. Although the characters in this book, many of whom are not formally named, may be fictionalised, the story behind the story, the corruption and greed of the post Apartheid and post Mandela South African Government, sadly were not. Based around real life people and Wildlife reservations, and with events very much based around an appalling truth, this is as much a lesson in history as it is a work of fiction, one that will hopefully make readers take note. It certainly opened my eyes to a part of history I was not fully aware of.

This is a story that is really in two parts but that are joined by a common thread - the corruption of the post Mandela South African Government. Firstly we have the story of the Zama Zama Game Reserve which has come under attack from poachers who are trying to murder their precious Rhinos in order to sell their tusks for profit. From the point of view of Ranger Isaac Mkhize we learn not only about the animals on the reserve, but also more about the local communities, about why Mkhize is so passionate about saving the herds and why other locals are driven to do the exact opposite. It is on one of the many safari's that Mkize meets two of the other key characters in this novel - Piet van der Merwe and Thandi Matjeke. Thandi and Mkhize soon strike up a friendship that will change Mkhize's life and outlook completely. Whilst he may have been passionate about conservation before, he knew little of the truth behind the politics, something to which his eyes, and that of the reader, are well and truly opened over the course of the novel.

The other side of the story is centred around a character called The Veteran, a former ANC chief activist who worked alongside Mandela to ensure a better and fairer future for Black South Africans and who has made it his mission to uproot the corrupt President and set South African politics, and especially his beloved ANC, back on the right path. He enlists the help of the spirited and passionate Thandi, a 'Born Free' South African who is determined to learn more about not just the politics of the past, but of the corruption of the present government, and through her Mkhize, although this is a relationship that proves to be mutually beneficial when their two worlds intersect in ways that Mkhize could not have imagined.

For me this book was as much a history lesson as it was a conservation based thriller. As I read it I found myself developing a far greater understanding of the political situation in South Africa, both during and post Apartheid. That isn't to say that the book is overloaded with detail, but it gives you a strong flavour of the struggles that drove the freedom movement and they way in which greed proved that it is not an affliction suffered only by those of white skin. I think the balance between this and the plight of the Rhinos, the trade in their horns being the thing that continued to fuel the greed and power of The President, is kept just right, using the political turmoil and the tension of the scenes in which Thandi and The Veteran seek to expose the government to goo effect. These offset against the quiet tension on the game reserve, when poachers attempt to penetrate Zama Zama's defences to get to their prize. The violence against the animals, when it comes, is kept off the page and I am thankful for that, but the impact of what is explained, of what the Poachers have done, is no less emotional and powerful for it.

The supporting characters, although largely unnamed, are of great importance to the plot. The Sniper, the Owner, iPhone Man - although you would find it hard to believe without having a name to attach to them a face to ascribe to them, they are still wholly fleshed out and well written. Thandi, The Veteran and Mkhize are three superb characters who I was engaged with from the off and Lord Hain has written them and the scenes between them perfectly, keeping the information flowing back and forth and using their sparse but vital interactions to drive the action and the urgency of the story forward. But then this is no mere story, the plight of the Rhinos, the greed of those behind their gradual destruction and the determination of those who fight to protect them and to change the corrupt political landscape all rooted in truth.

This is a keen political based thriller that exposes some of the worst of human nature. With a long but important set up, it gradually builds to a tense showdown that plays out in the only way the exposure of corruption really can. Using the global media and the Political stage as a conduit for change. But more than just a thriller, it is an important reminder of the kind of impact our greed and our lack of consideration for the planet, the constant need for expansion and for material things at the expense of the natural world, is having on our future and that of generations yet to come. It takes a hard person to read this book and not feel at least a small pang of guilt for that.

I wanted to like this, I really did. The combination of politics, corruption, activism and wildlife, all very real and current in the South African context, is rich with potential and a great fit with my own interests. The author has a great background for telling this story. And the plot is strong.

But it really doesn't work, for two main reasons.

First, the use of very thinly disguised real-world individuals as major characters in the novel felt uncomfortable, not least in the form of Bob Richard's, a British MP with a family background in South Africa and the anti-apartheid struggle. This is precisely the author's own history, and it felt a bit too close to self-aggrandisement. I had less problem with the unnamed "Veteran", who seems to be closely modelled on the former South African politician Ronnie Kasrils. "The President"'s identity is not really hidden at all, and nor will anybody will spend much time wondering who his cronies "the Business Brothers" who "came from India" are based on. I hope the publishers have good lawyers!

I might have been willing to overlook the above, on the grounds that the context and plot were so promising, if it were not for the second problem: the writing. It is clunky and disjointed, making the reader slow down repeatedly to unpack the grammar and work out what meaning was intended. It is full of repetition, repeatedly. The dialogue sounds like nothing anybody has ever said out loud. There is little depth to the characters. Background information is expounded at great length, interrupting the flow and slowing the story down - a reader wants some of that, but not this much, and a good writer smuggles it in almost unnoticed. And throughout, we are spoonfed plot details, robbing the story of much of its mystery - we're told what's happening and how the characters feel, but rarely shown it.

The end result is a big disappointment: a thriller that lacks tension, characters that don't feel real, and a reader who wishes he had broken the habit of a lifetime and quit before reaching the end. There is only so much weight a strong plot can carry.

The Rhino Conspiracy by Peter Hain is set in modern day South Africa, it combines a page turner about the battle against rhino poachers with a scathing critique of the corruption that pervaded South Africa in the post Mandela era.

Hain is well qualified to expose the corruption of the modern state but I was surprised at how good a thriller writer he is. This is really really good, I wonder what he will do next?

The Rhino Conspiracy

Peter Hain

Muswell Press



Peter Hain has produced an impressive snapshot of the political scene in Southern Africa during, and after Apartheid in this work. Leaving almost no issue uncovered, it it gives us a precis on political corruption in the ANC, the Aids epidemic, ivory poaching, domestic violence; even modern Chinese colonialism.

Interwoven with this array of facts and statistics are the characters making up the fictional adjunct of the book. Hain has assigned a portion of the major players with functional titles rather than names.

Leading these is “The Veteran”, a shadowy yet senior political player; “The Sniper”, a sniper; “The Owner” who is…well….the owner of a safari camp where most of the scenes of poaching play out, and “The Corporal”, acting out a subordinate role of surveillance and other subterfuge.

Original but disconcerting, this technique made it difficult to associate with these characters fully. Not to say they are undeveloped, but more obscure or aloof from access to the reader. Forgiving this, it says the important things about its major theme of ivory poaching and trafficking and the descent of Africa much in the vein of Tony Park and Frank Coates, both great recorders of things African.
Review by Booksoup.
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Many Thanks to Muswell Press and NetGalley for the privilege of reviewing this work.