I really enjoy books built around an idea so interesting that one wants to read it just to see what the author does with that idea. In the case of So Little to Go On, D. M. Dickinson provides two interesting ideas.

Idea 1: a mixed group of Europeans and Africans, men and women, young and old—among them a journalist, a volunteer with an NGO, attendees at a conference on low-cost housing, an MD, an entomologist, an archaeologist, a priest, a politician, and an elderly other with her adult son—stranded on the tarmac during a possible coup in an unnamed African country decide to hike 50 miles along jungle paths in order to reach the nearest border.

Idea 2: after cave paintings arise as a topic of conversation at the airport, the group agrees they will each tell the others a story that might explain the origin of cave paintings: who the artists were, what the images meant, why they were painted in caves that are difficult to access.

After an opening scene at the airport when the promised plane never arrives, the chapters alternate between descriptions of the group's journey through the jungle and tales invented by the different group members. This is the point where I have to acknowledge that I found a significant proportion of the characters in the novel difficult to like. The opening chapters, during which the group of strangers awaits the plane, then sets out on their journey were almost painful reading—not because anything particularly tragic happened, but simply because they consist of little beyond small talk among the group, punctuated by moments of hostility that may or may not have been caused by the precariousness of their situation.

I was ready to walk away from this book until the sharing of stories began. At that point, I was hooked. The monotony of their journey punctuated by the imaginative flights of their stories worked beautifully. There's not much of an arc to the novel: people hike and are crabby or pleasant, depending upon their personalities. It's the origin myths for cave painting that sustain readers, just as they sustain the novel's characters.

I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley. The opinions are my own.

I could not get into this book. I really struggled through and it was not for me. I was not a fan of the writing style and felt confused through a lot of the book.

Thank you for the advance copy.