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Heartprints of Africa: A Family's Story of Faith, Love, Adventure, and Turmoil: Volume 1 (East Africa series)
by
When Cinda decides to visit her identical twin, Linda, and family in Northern Uganda, little does she know they will soon be running for their lives. How did a relaxing vacation result in a terrifying escape from artillery and automatic gunfire? The answer begins four decades earlier when their parents and family of five children leave everything familiar in America to sta
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Kindle Edition, 265 pages
Published
September 21st 2015
by Ant Press
(first published September 17th 2015)
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Start your review of Heartprints of Africa: A Family's Story of Faith, Love, Adventure, and Turmoil: Volume 1 (East Africa series)

Cinda Adams Brooks’ memoir sizzles with the sights, sounds, and smells of her African childhood in the 1960s juxtaposed with a perilous return to that world as an adult. Brooks describes living in a place where the local greeting translates into “Are you alive?” – a logical question in a land where a life’s focus is on survival. She writes matter-of-factly of nights punctuated by “the cough and deep resonating roar” of lions and a vast orchestra of other beasts. Her descriptions of local delicac
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This book kept me captivated from the start. The author recalls memories, growing up as a missionary kid in Tanzania in the 1960's as well as a return visit to Uganda in 2004 to visit her twin sister. The chapters of the 1960's gives an insight to an idyllic life filled with adventure, fun, laughter and fond family memories, as her parents work as medical missionaries to the tribal people. This is contrasted to a different Africa in 2004 where conflict and war brings a danger beyond wild animals
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What a tale this is! Cinda’s memoir begins in 2004 when she and her husband visit her sister in Uganda. Trouble is brewing between various factions and almost immediately they find themselves desperately running for their lives. The narrative had me holding my breath as it is so dramatic and terrifying. The tale of the family’s flight is cleverly woven together with the story of Cinda’s childhood in Africa. She moved to Tanzania as a five year old child when her parents were called to be Mission ...more

I was delighted with this book. I've been meaning to read it for a while and finally downloaded it and took it with me on a trip to San Diego last week. I didn't know what to expect since the main reason I read it was that the author went to school in Kenya with my family BUT I was hooked from the first few pages.
This story of a few days of challenges as the author visits her twin sister and family in northern Uganda, is interspersed with tales of the author's family's missionary years in Tanza ...more
This story of a few days of challenges as the author visits her twin sister and family in northern Uganda, is interspersed with tales of the author's family's missionary years in Tanza ...more

A beautifully written memoir of family, faith and adventure. This is not a book I could speed read through nor did I want to. Cinda writes her of her families lives in 1960's Africa and twin Linda's family life as missionaries in 2004 Africa. I love how she intertwines the two stories to tell the tale. At a young age, their parents prepare the twins and their three brothers for life and to have a deep connection with God. Their connection to Africa runs deep and me love the continent that I have
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This was a fascinating account of both the author's life growing up in Africa as the daughter of a missionary and then the experience she and her husband have when they go back to to Africa visit her identical twin sister Linda and Linda's husband and children now serving as missionaries in Africa. I have been involved in church and religious/spiritual activities my entire life, much of it in Southern Baptist churches (which is the denomination Cinda's family was involved with during her childho
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This book was so good. I particularly enjoyed it because I am writing a book that partly takes place in the same area so it was a good reference.
Sometimes as she bounced between the 60s and her childhood growing up in Africa and then to 2004 it was a little slow, but she really built the momentum to the final crisis and I was on the edge of my seat.
Sometimes as she bounced between the 60s and her childhood growing up in Africa and then to 2004 it was a little slow, but she really built the momentum to the final crisis and I was on the edge of my seat.

"Like a thumbprint, a heartprint is unique. Life experiences, victories, struggles, and wounds are their ridges and valleys. Unlike footprints, swept away as a fading memory, they endure and connect across generations and cultures. Africa lures its people back. A call, dampened by the busyness of American life, never disappears. It still whispers and beckons to me in the quiet." —Cinda Adams Brooks
In 2004, bullets are starting to fly near the Uganda town where the author's twin sister, Linda, ha ...more

Aside from the fact that Cinda Brooks had told me that bullets are flying in the opening scene of her book, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I bought her memoir, African Heartprints. After all, it is about her experience growing up as a missionary kid in Tanzania in the 1960s interwoven with an account of a return trip to Uganda in 2004 to visit her identical twin sister Linda, who is living a remake of their mother’s life. Would Cinda’s memoir be filled with syrupy witness? Definitely not! Fai
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I was fortunate to be given a copy of this book by a third party, to beta read prior to publication.
The continent of Africa frequently conjures romantic images in the mind, of life on the veldts, safari, wild animals, heat and relaxation. Rarely does it suggest long separations from family on another continent, intense heat, long travels on dusty roads, home schooling children, illness and tribal wars. Cinda Adams Brooks' memoir contains all of these experiences and more. As a child in the 1960s ...more
The continent of Africa frequently conjures romantic images in the mind, of life on the veldts, safari, wild animals, heat and relaxation. Rarely does it suggest long separations from family on another continent, intense heat, long travels on dusty roads, home schooling children, illness and tribal wars. Cinda Adams Brooks' memoir contains all of these experiences and more. As a child in the 1960s ...more

I was lucky enough to beta-read this Memoir by Cinda Adams Brooks - It took 5 years for the Author to put together and in my humble opion she should be very pleased with her efforts. 2004 - The Author & her husband are making plans to visit with her twin sister Linda - Linda lives with her family in Uganda - Very exciting for them all as they are a very close-family - The holiday/visit begins wonderfully until their lives are turned inside-out/upside-down when they realise danger is a-foot - the
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This was a really good story of a strong family that moved to Africa as medical missionaries in 1960. It is told by one of the daughters Cinda and her twin Linda as a contributor.
This book goes between their life growing up with their parents at their different missions around Africa, to 2004 where Cinda who lives in Texas goes back to Africa, with her husband to visit her sister who has carried on the tradition of being a missionary with her husband and kids.
They seemed to have had an Ideal lif ...more
This book goes between their life growing up with their parents at their different missions around Africa, to 2004 where Cinda who lives in Texas goes back to Africa, with her husband to visit her sister who has carried on the tradition of being a missionary with her husband and kids.
They seemed to have had an Ideal lif ...more

Cinda Adams Brooks named this perfectly - Heartbeats of Africa. I have only been to Africa twice and it captured my heart. If I had been introduced to Africa as Cinda and her family were it would be imbedded in my heart. Cindas was brought up in a missionary family, moving constantly throughout Africa. The book moves back and forth between life as a young family and the continuation of life as the family grew older. I never knew the dedication of a missionary family, how their good works are int
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"Heartprints" will steal your heart!
Heartprints of Africa is a heart-gripping, beautiful tale of family, faith and adventure. In it, the author intimately shares her sweet childhood memories of growing up in a medical missionary family in East Africa. But this innocence is later tested by war and a dangerous military evacuation. Along the way and through the years, her experience of meeting and joining distinctly different cultures is beautifully described: "As friction creates pearls in an oyst ...more
Heartprints of Africa is a heart-gripping, beautiful tale of family, faith and adventure. In it, the author intimately shares her sweet childhood memories of growing up in a medical missionary family in East Africa. But this innocence is later tested by war and a dangerous military evacuation. Along the way and through the years, her experience of meeting and joining distinctly different cultures is beautifully described: "As friction creates pearls in an oyst ...more

Heartprints is a book about growing up in Africa and visiting again many years later. The author and her family lived through a great deal and the book is filled with vivid descriptions and beautiful storytelling. I could feel myself yearning to go back to Africa, as a result of reading this fascinating memoir.

I loved this book and found myself sneaking chapters wherever I could. I have a sister and I love her dearly but I do not have a twin. The author does and weaves her twindome skilfully through their lives in Africa as youngsters, their strong family ties, their faith and their love of the country and its people.
I was intrigued with her descriptions of their living conditions, their intrepid treks in the family Landrover, the raw beauty of the country and the unflinching dedication of their paren ...more
I was intrigued with her descriptions of their living conditions, their intrepid treks in the family Landrover, the raw beauty of the country and the unflinching dedication of their paren ...more
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Cinda grew up with her identical twin, Linda, and three brothers in East Africa where their parents served as medical missionaries. Her nursing, health education, and law enforcement careers combined for a rich twenty-year career teaching fitness, wellness, defensive tactics, and survival at the Texas Game Warden Training Academy. She currently pursues her mission -- to unleash the champion in peo
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