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The Native Commissioner
A welcome step towards the reconstitution of South African past.'
Solace
The body of a Muslim boy is found in a synagogue, mutilated in what looks like a ritual sacrifice, and Inspector Eberard Februarie is called in to solve the case. As news of the murder quickly becomes public, a storm of religious violence threatens to engulf Cape Town. Eberard, however, suspects that the case is not as clear cut as it seems. But can he prove this before the storm breaks? In his investigation, Eberard must steer between Islamist agitators determined to spread unrest, shady security agents trying to trip him up, and a powerful church pastor intent on exploiting the situation for his own purposes. The story moves swiftly from forensic laboratory to drug house, from church office to street demonstration, as the case takes unpredictable and violent twists. A gripping novel with an unstoppable plot, Solace exposes the religious tensions that threaten to tear society apart.
You Never Really Know
Meet our hero Cappuccino – barista to the President – who’s never lived anywhere other than in the big man’s compound. Left in the care of Maria-I’m-not-your-mother when his real mom died, Cappuccino spent his boyhood in the laundry room before receiving his true calling. From behind his impressive chrome coffee machine, Cappuccino is a fly on a very important wall. And, more importantly, he is in love with the captivating Naomi, an assistant to the President. But life is about to serve Cappuccino a bitter cup when he finds the Minister without Portfolio – and moral compass to The Boss – dead in the presidential home. Filled with warm humour, John Hunt’s novel serves up a double shot of pathos as it moves from playful satire to true tragedy whilst examining the inner workings of power.
Good Cop, Bad Cop
Once an enemy of the apartheid police, Andrew Brown has worked as a police reservist for almost twenty years. In this book he takes the reader on patrol with him – into the ganglands of the Cape Flats, the townships of Masiphumelele and Nyanga, and the high-walled Southern Suburbs. Good Cop, Bad Cop is a personal account of the perilous and often conflicting work of a SAPS officer. Brown describes being shot at, arresting suspects in a drug bust, chasing down leads in a homicide investigation, and keeping the peace during the UCT student protests. Brown illustrates how difficult the job of the police is, and how easy it is to react with undue force. Yet he argues passionately that the role of the police is to be a service to communities and not a force to suppress social discontent. Gripping and thought-provoking, this is a fascinating insight into the social fabric of current South Africa.
The Spiral House
Katrijn van der Caab, freed slave and wigmaker’s apprentice, travels with her eccentric employer from Cape Town to Vogelzang, a remote farm where a hairless girl needs their services. The year is 1794, it is the age of enlightenment, and on Vogelzang the master is conducting strange experiments in human breeding and classification. It is also here that Trijn falls in love. Two hundred years later and a thousand miles away, Sister Vergilius, a nun at a mission hospital, wants to free herself from an austere order. It is 1961 and her life intertwines with that of a gentleman farmer – an Englishman and suspected Communist – who collects and studies insects and lives a solitary life. While a group of Americans arrive in a cavalcade of caravans and a new republic is about to be born, desire is unfurling slowly. In Claire Robertson’s majestic debut novel, two stories echo across centuries to expose that which binds us and sets us free.
The Dream House
A farmhouse is being reproduced a dozen times, with slight variations, throughout a valley. Three small graves have been dug in the front garden, the middle one lying empty. A woman in a wheelchair sorts through boxes while her husband clambers around the old demolished buildings, wondering where the animals have gone. A young woman – called ‘the barren one’ behind her back – dreams of love, while an ageing headmaster contemplates the end of his life. At the entrance to the long dirt driveway, a car appears and pauses – pointed towards the house like a silver bullet, ticking with heat. So begins The Dream House, Craig Higginson’s riveting and unforgettable novel set in the Midlands of KwaZulu-Natal. Written with dark wit, a stark poetic style and extraordinary tenderness, this is a story about the state of a nation and a deep meditation on memory, ageing, meaning, family, love and loss. This updated 2016 edition contains new content, with Craig Higginson exploring the background to The Dream House, his varied experiences in a farmhouse in KwaZulu-Natal and the subsequent and poignant motivations for this moving novel.
High Times
High Times is the true story of Michael Medjuck, whose taste for weed, women and the good life led him from late-1960s Johannesburg to notoriety as one of the biggest hash and weed smugglers in North America. From his base in Vancouver, Michael built up a smuggling network that supplied dealers in scores of cities across Canada and the United States. The proceeds from smuggling afforded this former King David High School pupil a lifestyle of hedonistic excess – the finest wines, the most glamorous hookers, the best weed in the world. In 1991, Michael was nabbed by US federal agents while smuggling an enormous shipload of Afghani hash into the West Coast of Canada. Put on trial as the schem...
Through a dragonfly eye
Jenny’s compelling South African memoir chronicles her journey from childhood during World War Two to a busy freelance career as a journalist and novelist. With humour, tenderness and love for her family and country, she reflects on the many facets of her life as an author, giving fascinating insights into the writing process. Among Jenny’s lasting legacies are her decades-long drive to promote reading as the essential skill for a good education, and her role as one of the co-founders of the Franschhoek Literary Festival, of which she was Director for four years.
Devil's Harvest
After a secret drone strike on a civilian target in South Sudan, RAF air marshal George Bartholomew discovers that a piece of shrapnel traceable back to a British Reaper has been left behind at the scene. He will do anything to get it back, but he is not the only one. Dissatisfied with his life and ousted from the marital bed, Associate Professor Gabriel Cockburn, an ambitious botanist at Bristol University, sets out to South Sudan in pursuit of a rare plant that is crucial to his research. Once there, he finds himself caught up in the travails of a young Sudanese woman, Alek, who agrees to guide him through dangerous territory to find the plant. But Alek has an agenda of her own. As events move beyond their control, the lives of these characters are thrown together, with explosive results. A political thriller that spans the globe, from the halls of Bristol University and London’s secretive MI6 building to the dusty streets of Juba and the refugee camps in war-torn South Sudan, Devil’s Harvest exposes the dark truths of the international arms trade and the plight of the world’s newest country.
Street Blues
In 1999 Andrew Brown donned the uniform of the new South African Police Service as a rookie reservist, after years of viewing the police as the enemy. This book documents his experiences over nearly a decade, offering a glimpse into the day-to-day life of a police officer on the beat in one of the most crime-ridden societies in the world. Street Blues takes the reader from high-octane car chases and drug busts to the gritty world of gangsterism and prostitution. It covers issues as diverse as hijacking and petty theft, traffic collisions and firefighting. Brown explores the stresses and complexities of police work, the fear and frustration, as well as the camaraderie and courage. Shifting between tragedy and humour, this book gives personal insight into a perilous and sometimes shocking world that affects us all. Written from direct experience rather than distanced observation, Street Blues is a must-read for anyone concerned with crime and policing in South Africa.
