Zan: Birth of a Legend — Jane Shoup

In 1908, on a mission to find a new breed of ape in central Africa, an unfathomable thing is discovered â€" a wild, white man, living amongst gorillas. Local villagers call him matokeo ya utafutaji kwa, the untamed one. In England, renowned photographer, Sullivan Vinson, investigates and discovers the likely explanation, that the man is Sebastian Shaffer, the six year old boy who somehow escaped the massacre of Bishop Hannington's ill-fated party more than twenty years previous. Sullivan and his spirited twenty-one year old niece and ward, Arianna Day, journey to Africa to join the team tracking the man. They do not find him but, unbeknownst to anyone, the untamed one watches Arianna day and night. Believing she is meant for him, he steals into her tent at night and captures her. When Ari is rescued, the man is taken into protective custody. Against their will, they are sent separate ways, Sebastian to the care of esteemed anthropologist John Emerson to be retaught language and learn social skills, Ari back home to England to try to fit back into her old life. An advantageous marriage proposal awaits, but thoughts of Sebastian haunt her. Amidst the backdrop of London in the summer of 1908 as the Olympic Games are hosted and the Franko-British Exhibition is held, Sebastian ‘Zan' returns to a London he does not remember with one goal in mind, being reunited with Arianna. As a member of Lord Dalton Bluford's household, he has no worries over day to day survival, but he struggles to fit into his new life. When a private agent of inquiry finds Zan's relatives, he regains memories and a sense of belonging. Ari is forced to accept another man's proposal while Lord Bluford proposes a union between his beloved granddaughter Vanessa and Zan, but Zan's goal has never altered. Again and again, he and Ari are drawn together only to be ripped apart by circumstances, social convention and Marshall Derringer, the man determined to have her as his wife. But Zan is not the only one with an untamed heart. ‘Brilliant, thought provoking and addictive reading.' â€"Affaire de Coeur Magazine