• Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight

  • An African Childhood
  • By: Alexandra Fuller
  • Narrated by: Lisette Lecat
  • Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (1,073 ratings)

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Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight  By  cover art

Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight

By: Alexandra Fuller
Narrated by: Lisette Lecat
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Publisher's summary

Alexandra Fuller tells the idiosyncratic story of her life growing up white in rural Rhodesia as it was becoming Zimbabwe. The daughter of hardworking, yet strikingly unconventional English-bred immigrants, Alexandra arrives in Africa at the tender age of two. She moves through life with a hardy resilience, even as a bloody war approaches. Narrator Lisette Lecat reads this remarkable memoir of a family clinging to a harsh landscape and the dying tenets of colonialism.
©2001 Alexandra Fuller (P)2003 Recorded Books, LLC

Critic reviews

  • Book Sense Book of the Year Award Winner, Adult Non-Fiction, 2003

"A classic is born in this tender, intensely moving and even delightful journey through a white African girl's childhood." (Publishers Weekly)
"This was no ordinary childhood, and it makes a riveting story thanks to an extraordinary telling." (School Library Journal)
"In this powerful debut, Fuller fully succeeds in memorializing the beauty of each desert puddle and each African summer night sky while also recognizing that beauty can lie hidden in the faces of those who have crossed her path. Highly recommended." (Library Journal)
"An honest, moving portrait of one family struggling to survive tumultuous times." (Booklist)

What listeners say about Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
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Performance
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  • 3 Stars
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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

An interesting tale, well-told, but...

Alexandra Fuller has led a fascinating life, not always by her own choosing. Her parents were untrustworthy, accidental carpetbaggers who fumbled through a sinister landscape to which they had no claim, and to which they felt entitled. The story Fuller tells is occasionally funny and often heartbreaking. It is her own story, and she is to be congratulated for surviving it. But this book is not for everyone, and will sometimes leave the listener feeling contempt for the primary personae. The lilting, perfect voice of Lisette Lecat, who also reads the more-affable "#1 Ladies Detective Agency" series, is always welcome.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Superb, fascinating

Fascinating, enchanting, well-written, beautifully narrated. Poignant story about women dealing with life and overcoming hardships amidst the harsh and foreign beauty of several different African countries as white foreigners. The story got better and more enjoyable with every hour I listened.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

So Real, True and Understated - Excellent!

I Loved this book, and was delighted when the audio version recently became available to listeners in South Africa. (Thank you, Audible).

I could relate to everything Fuller wrote (from the longdrop toilets to the earthiness of our being), and admired her simple, factual, undramatic, almost understated style. You need to read/listen between the lines in order to begin to understand the enormous courage, fortitude, endurance which this family lived from day to day. How they continued the struggle of survival, which Africa often is, in the face of all obstacles and severe trials.

A lovely read that reached deep into my heart.

It brought back so many memories.

I still have a bag in my cupboard, with "Rhodesia" and an elephant printed on it. A relic from years since, and yet it stays while others get turfed out. With it is a book, called "Hold My Hand, I'm Dying".

I remember the almost unbearable heat, walking along the Zambezi, each of us carrying a garden umbrella in an effort to shield ourselves from the blistering, dessicating sun. Then the songs we sang as we bumped along in an old pick-up: (regret, composer unknown)

O the stinging tsetse flies and the crocodile eyes
This is no place to dally
For there's no food here and I long for a beer
In the hot Zambezi valley.

In the cool place that i come from
The women are like velvet
The bulldogs all have rubber teeth
And the hens lay instant omelettes.

Oooooooh the stinging tsetse flies .....

Thank you, Alexandra Fuller. I'm sure you miss Africa and are glad you're gone, all mixed up into one great big emotion.

Lisette Lecat's narration was superb with no jarring accents to a local ear. She seems to have lived in these parts, and has a lovely voice.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Loved the Narration

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This is a good book for anyone with an interest in African modern history.

Have you listened to any of Lisette Lecat’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Lisette Lecat has done marvelous readings for Alexander McCall's 'The Lady's First Detective' series. Her performance in 'Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight' certainly is a plus.

Any additional comments?

The story line rather rambled at times, and at other times was gripping. I did learn more about what it was like to live in Rhodesia, as the country became Zimbabwe.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

So different and honest

Fuller's biography about growing up as a white African during the 70s and 80s in each African country ruled/formerly ruled by the British is fascinating. She doesn't gloss over her own rough behavior or warts of her family. Their living experience is really interesting as it was totally different than growing up in the US during the same period.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A Beautiful African story

The book was so well narrated with constant and spot on accents and dialects.
A must read for anyone who grew up in or around Southern Africa. A story that brings back hauntingly beautiful, sad and nostalgic memories.
The end came too quickly despite its length.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

The narration makes this story come alive!

I can't imagine the enjoyment I would miss hearing Alexandra Fuller's voice come alive (thanks to Lisette Lecat) if I had read the book instead. She conveys all of the wonder, mischief and charm of "Bobo"'s view of the world as a child and brings life to her mother and father's quirky ways. Brava!

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An engaging window into another world

Memoir is curious because there is no real plot here other than the path through the author's life, but it's quite an interesting path that I'm glad she wrote about. I've traveled a fair bit, but this is not the sort of world to which I would ordinarily travel, so it was fascinating to get a look into it through the author's eyes. The account is quite engaging and the observations seemed honest and insightful, particularly in the areas of colonialism (and postcolonialist nostalgia), race relations, and poverty.

The author isn't heavy-handedly defensive about her positions on these complex social issues. Rather, she puts us back into the moment that various events occurred and tells us how she was perceiving them at the time, even as the style of her writing, the better objectivity and clarity with which she describes such thoughts, suggests that she perhaps evolved in her attitudes as life went on. It's especially great that she shares accounts of some situations that probably provoked her to such evolution.

The performance by Lisette Lecat really brings the whole account to life in a very vivid and personal way.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Very well written, expertly read - narrator had a pleasant accent and made for easy listerpning.

I thought the story of Bobo's formative years was very interesting - her world and family so different and engaging, bold, unexpected, exciting.
The description of her family was fascinating, each member of the family described in a truthful yet witty way. Her mother was so much, fun and yet very sharp and unpredictable at times.
I recommend it to readers who enjoy great non-fiction in the form of a memoir - but a page-turner, taking place in some very dangerous places in Africa.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Glad I finally read this book!

I bought the audible version a few days ago. I listened for two days and could not stop until the end. The book and the story are riveting and well written. The reader is amazing, one of the best I have heard.

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