The East African Revival was a cultural and religious movement that emerged in the early 1930s and whose impact upon the life of East African societies and Churches – as well as global Evangelicalism – can be traced into the present. In African initiative and inspiration, Daewon Moon has contributed a thorough and sound monograph to the historiography of the East African Revival, focusing on its early history in colonial-era Uganda and Rwanda.

Given the revival movement's geographical expansiveness, as well as its enduring regional legacies, it is somewhat surprising that the movement has not received the same level of scholarly attention as many other populist religious movements. From the 1950s to the 1990s, much of what was written about the revival was comprised of theological assessments of the movement. The revival also became known to international evangelists, missiologists, pastors and theologians who sought to draw normative lessons about revival and renewal movements from what happened in East Africa. Starting in the late 1980s, Kevin Ward began publishing the most historically robust work on the movement. Ward's work connected the revival movement to a thorough examination of colonial religion and institutions, and it provided a solid foundation for an archivally driven history of the movement.

African initiative and inspiration follows from Ward's analysis and historiography. Moon's historical research was drawn mostly from British missionary archives and records from the Church of Uganda. He made good use of related archival sources, such as Catherine Robins's ethnographical interview transcripts that were collected for her dissertation on the revival in the early 1970s. It is evident from the monograph that Moon reviewed these primary sources assiduously. His arguments and conclusions are thoroughly documented, and he seeks to stick close to what is present in the historical record. As a result, Moon's writing and descriptions of people and events are clear, consistent and fair.

The chapters are largely chronological in their organisation, beginning with a discussion of the revival's origins in Rwanda and Uganda, and moving through early independence. Moon focuses upon institutions and elite players within the movement – meaning revival elders and European missionaries who joined it. The names that dominate Moon's narrative -- Joe Church, Blasio Kigozi, Yosiya Kinuka and William Nagenda -- are likely familiar to those with some knowledge of the revival. Moon argues that it is imperative to understand the theological worldview that African revivalists developed and which they infused within the movement from the start. Moon's argument seems to have as its target a disagreement with the analysis found in Derek Peterson's Ethnic patriotism and the East African revival, which describes revivalists’ rhetoric and moral decision-making as a form of ‘dissent’, thereby placing it within the tumultuous political world of the late colonial period rather than deferring to the spiritual beliefs of the revivalists.

The strongest and most original chapter in the book is the one on the revival and colonial education. This chapter is where Moon most thoroughly contextualises one aspect of the movement with respect to an important cultural and economic dimension of colonial society. The research in this chapter seemed deeper and more complex than what appeared in other chapters, much of which might be familiar content to those who have read previous work on the revival movement.

By way of critique, I think a couple points are worth noting. This book is an insider’s account that is premised upon the voices of those who converted to the revival. It gives an analysis of the movement that most revivalists would probably think fair and recognisable. As such, there is not much room for critique of the movement, or for considering the contemporary perspectives of those outside of the movement, or of those who may have adhered to the movement and then left or were pushed out for some reason. Since insider accounts of the revival have been around since the 1930s, it seems reasonable to ask whether future research on this movement might extend beyond those who were the proverbial ‘true believers’ and central figures in the movement. This connects to a second criticism, which is that Derek Peterson's work made a painstaking and monumental effort to do just that. The lack of real engagement with Peterson's arguments about the revival movement and colonial religion and politics is a significant analytical omission. As a result, Moon puts forward analyses of the revival movement, but these arguments feel somewhat insulated from related work in African studies and religious studies.

If one is looking for a single monograph that gives a thorough historical overview of the early decades of the East African Revival, this book is probably the best place to start. It is more robust than Jacobs and MacMaster's Gentle wind of God; it has a historical overview that is carefully and intelligently described, which is a feature my own book on the subject does not have; and it offers descriptions of the revival movement as a movement that Peterson's work typically does not prioritise. Those who are familiar with the work of Kevin Ward will find a similar tone and analysis here, though elaborated in much more detail. Moon's first monograph reads as a solid contribution within the field of World Christianity.