Tough-O-Meter

We've got your back. With the Tough-O-Meter, you'll know whether to bring extra layers or Swiss army knives as you summit the literary mountain. (10 = Toughest)

Tree Line (6)

Once you get used to the foreign place-names and get into the groove of the foreign languages that just creep in whenever they feel like it, you'll enjoy the burn of the steep climb. And the views of Blixen's memories (and Kenya's highlands) are worth every step.

This book edges dangerously close to stream-of-consciousness territory, so you might need to slow down a few times in order to absorb it. But if you get confused and start wishing that you had a nice, straightforward Ernest Hemingway novel to read, remember that, when Hemingway received the Nobel Prize, he said that it should have gone to "that beautiful Danish writer Isak Dinesen."