When the Lion Feeds

Name: When the Lion Feeds
Rating: 4.5 (11774 reviews)

by Wilbur Smith Book 1 in the When the Lion Feeds Sequence series.

First published 1964

Amazon

4.5(11,774)

Southern Africa in the later nineteenth century. Twin brothers Sean and Garrick Courtney grow up on a cattle farm but respond differently to injury, ambition and family rivalry. Sean seeks advancement through war, hunting and commerce while Garrick remains tied to home. The Anglo-Zulu War and the Witwatersrand gold rush provide successive opportunities for Sean to turn physical courage into social and financial power.

Their lives pass through the Anglo-Zulu War and the gold rush on the Witwatersrand. Wealth and expansion magnify resentments between the brothers, turning the creation of a business empire into a destructive contest over inheritance, love and status. The same expansion that rewards him also produces dispossession and family rupture, establishing the moral ambiguity that runs through later Courtney generations.