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Reading with Matcha
A personal space where I share what I love, what moves me, and what I would recommend without hesitation.
Love in the Wild: A Tarzan Retelling
Emma Castle
★★★★★Synopsis
Eden Matthews travels to the heart of Africa to photograph gorillas in their natural habitat, the job she always dreamed of. Everything falls apart when her group is attacked by a band of treasure hunters and she is left as the only survivor, saved by a man who appears among the trees and looks like no one she has ever seen. Thorne grew up in the jungle after an accident left him alone as a child, raised by a family of gorillas with no language other than the one the wild taught him. Eden cannot stop wondering who he is and what happened to him, and for the first time he finds himself facing someone of his own kind who takes his whole world apart. The attraction between them is impossible to ignore, but the threat that arrived with the hunters is still out there, and protecting the jungle and the family that raised him becomes a race against time.
The protagonists
Thorne
The man raised by gorillas
He grew up in the jungle after an accident left him alone as a small child, raised by a family of gorillas with no language other than the one the wild taught him. He is untamed, silent and fiercely loyal to his own, and Eden is the first person to shake everything he thought he knew about where he belongs.
Eden Matthews
Wildlife photographer
A wildlife photographer who travels to the heart of Africa to capture gorillas in their natural habitat. She survives an attack that wipes out her entire group and, instead of running, becomes determined to understand who the man who saved her is and what led him to grow up in the wild. She is curious, brave and ends up fighting for a world that was never hers.
My review
It all started with a piece of Tarzan and Jane fanart. I saw it and I was left with this huge urge to read something that felt like that story, and out of all the recommendations that came my way, this book showed up. It did not disappoint me at all. I really liked the story overall. It is told in third person, so we get to step into several perspectives, even into how the animals in the story feel, and that gives it a beautiful texture. It has a touch of magic that goes hand in hand with the magic Africa has always carried, and at the same time it touches on sensitive subjects that are everyday reality on that continent and that we often forget in the routine of our own lives. Eden arrives in Africa to photograph gorillas, but her group is attacked by treasure hunters and she is the only survivor, all thanks to a wild man who appears and rescues her. Thorne, a man raised by gorillas, ends up saving the woman who turns his world upside down. From there the two of them are thrown into a race to survive and to save the jungle, all while the sparks fly between them. I fully recommend this one to anyone looking for a good time and for something similar to Tarzan, because even though the premise is obviously similar, the author manages to break away from it and create her own story.
Who is this for?
For anyone who has always wanted to read a grown up version of the Tarzan and Jane story
For readers who enjoy romance with nature, adventure and a touch of magic
For anyone who wants an entertaining story that also talks about conservation and what is happening in Africa today
Where to buy it?
AmazonReading with Matcha · Made with love by Ari