Blue Fire
by Phyllis A. Whitney
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A bride is swept up in family secrets and the blood diamond trade when she returns to South Africa in this novel by a New York Times–bestselling author.When Chicagoan Susan Hohenfield brings her new husband, Dirk, to her childhood home in Cape Town, it’s with the innocence of a young girl. She remembers only the beauty of South Africa—and the pain of being abandoned by her father. Now, with a new perspective, she sees a country destroyed by apartheid. And her father, once accused show more of diamond smuggling, seems not the ogre she imagined, but a broken man powerless against the prison term that wrenched him from his daughter’s arms.
At least that’s the story Susan has been told. But she’ll discover the truth as this intimate family reunion raises grave and troubling new questions. Why is the man responsible for her father’s fate still lingering in the shadows? Why has Dirk’s former lover arrived with threats and incriminations? And why does Susan feel like a stranger in her own home? Now, in a place that is at once strange and familiar, charged with fear and intrigue, Susan must confront a dangerous past that isn’t quite through with her.
More than a classic gothic tale, Blue Fire is one of the first novels to deal with the turmoil in South Africa. It was written nearly three decades before the dismantling of apartheid and a half-century before the film Blood Diamond would bring attention to the devastating effects of the smuggling trade.
This ebook features an illustrated biography of Phyllis A. Whitney including rare images from the author’s estate.
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“Blue Fire” by Phyllis Whitney is a 1969 publication.
Susan, spent her early years in Cape Town but moved to Chicago after a fiery exchange between her parents. After her mother’s death, Dirk, a guy she remembers as a child, shows up in Chicago with the sole purpose of convincing her to come back to South Africa. Initially she is quite resistant, but Dirk refuses to leave, and she ends up falling in love with him. After a whirlwind romance, she and Dirk marry- and she finds herself back in Cape Town after all… and face to face with her estranged father.
Before long, Susan realizes that several people are under the impression she might have some memories related to a missing diamond and are hoping that her being back in Cape Town show more might shake those memories loose. She is also made aware that her own mother was suspected of diamond theft- a scenario she refuses to entertain. But a series of incidents have Susan on edge- making her hyper-aware of the diamond smuggling operations in Cape Town and the danger she might be in…
Phyllis Whitney was one of a handful of authors back in the sixties and seventies that rose to the top of the mass-produced Gothic/ Romantic suspense genre that was extremely popular at the time. This book, however, does not fall into that category- in my opinion- as it is missing several huge, key elements required to make it fit into the Gothic category. Romantic suspense is also out, though there is a promise of that, but nothing I'd truly call romance. To me, the style seemed more like today’s psychological thriller genre. This story is very suspenseful, and the reader is kept in the dark as to who is or is not trustworthy. The atmosphere is very taut and edgy- especially for its time.
Overall, for a book written over a half a century ago- it's pretty good. There are some dated terms and verbiage one will have to overlook, but kudos to the author for exposing the dangerous, greedy diamond industry long before the general population was made aware it. A solid 'retro-read' for me.
4 stars show less
Susan, spent her early years in Cape Town but moved to Chicago after a fiery exchange between her parents. After her mother’s death, Dirk, a guy she remembers as a child, shows up in Chicago with the sole purpose of convincing her to come back to South Africa. Initially she is quite resistant, but Dirk refuses to leave, and she ends up falling in love with him. After a whirlwind romance, she and Dirk marry- and she finds herself back in Cape Town after all… and face to face with her estranged father.
Before long, Susan realizes that several people are under the impression she might have some memories related to a missing diamond and are hoping that her being back in Cape Town show more might shake those memories loose. She is also made aware that her own mother was suspected of diamond theft- a scenario she refuses to entertain. But a series of incidents have Susan on edge- making her hyper-aware of the diamond smuggling operations in Cape Town and the danger she might be in…
Phyllis Whitney was one of a handful of authors back in the sixties and seventies that rose to the top of the mass-produced Gothic/ Romantic suspense genre that was extremely popular at the time. This book, however, does not fall into that category- in my opinion- as it is missing several huge, key elements required to make it fit into the Gothic category. Romantic suspense is also out, though there is a promise of that, but nothing I'd truly call romance. To me, the style seemed more like today’s psychological thriller genre. This story is very suspenseful, and the reader is kept in the dark as to who is or is not trustworthy. The atmosphere is very taut and edgy- especially for its time.
Overall, for a book written over a half a century ago- it's pretty good. There are some dated terms and verbiage one will have to overlook, but kudos to the author for exposing the dangerous, greedy diamond industry long before the general population was made aware it. A solid 'retro-read' for me.
4 stars show less
Set in South Africa of the 1960's, the tension between white and black, the smuggling of diamonds, and the frailty of people, lead to tense drama atop Table Mountain. It is a story of mounting suspense, but a hopeful end. Wonderful description of Cape Town at that time.
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Stories set on African soil
183 works; 2 members
Author Information
108+ Works 11,675 Members
Mystery author Phyllis A. Whitney was born in Yokohama, Japan to American parents on September 9, 1903. After her father's death in 1918, she and her mother traveled from Japan to San Francisco, California on an ocean liner. In 1924, she graduated from McKinley High School in Chicago and sold short stories to newspapers, church papers, and pulp show more magazines as well as worked in bookstores and libraries. She was a Children's Book Editor of the Chicago Sun's Book Week from 1942 to 1946 and the Philadelphia Inquirer from 1947 to 1948. She also taught juvenile fiction writing courses at Northwestern University in 1945 and at New York University from 1947 to 1958. She writes both juvenile and adult mysteries, many set in an exotic location. Her first juvenile book was published in 1941 and her first adult novel was published in 1943. Since then, she has written over 75 books. She has won numerous awards including the Edgar Allen Poe Award in 1961 and 1964, the Sequoyah Award of Oklahoma, and the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America in 1988. Phyllis A. Whitney passed away on February 8, 2008 at the age of 104. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title*
- Fuego Azul
- Original title
- Blue Fire
- Original publication date
- 1960
- First words
- He saw her almost at once.
- Original language*
- English
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.
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- Members
- 118
- Popularity
- 275,115
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.66)
- Languages
- 5 — English, Norwegian (Bokmål), Norwegian, Spanish, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 19
- ASINs
- 9
