Book picks similar to
New Times by Rehana Rossouw
in-reading-pile
sa-fiction
school-texts
south-africa
Eggs to Lay, Chickens to Hatch: A Memoir
Chris van Wyk - 2010
As the years passed, the two grew closer, swapping stories about coloureds and zulus, life in Riverlea and Soweto, pass laws, politics and falling in love.
Skinner's Drift
Lisa Fugard - 2005
In this beautiful first novel, Lisa Fugard paints a haunting portrait of a family careering toward disaster. She vividly describes the isolation of Eva's rebellious and lonely English mother; the desperation of her Afrikaner father as drought destroys his farm; the conflicts among the black farmworkers as the younger generation questions the loyalty and subservience of their elders; and the dangerous silence of a young girl who witnesses too much.Like Nadine Gordimer and J. M. Coetzee, Fugard has written a profoundly moving family drama, subtly set against the backdrop of a country in turmoil. She moves with extraordinary agility between intimate and revelatory domestic scenes and the fiercely challenging land. This is a powerful story from a stunning new writer.
Killing Karoline
Sara-Jayne King - 2017
Her story reveals the shocking lie created to cover up the forbidden relationship and the hurried overseas adoption of the illegitimate baby, born during one of history’s most inhumane and destructive regimes. Killing Karoline follows the journey of the baby girl who is raised in a leafy, middle-class corner of the South of England by a white couple. Plagued by questions surrounding her own identity and unable to ‘fit in’ Sara-Jayne begins to turn on herself. She eventually returns to South Africa, after 26 years, to face her demons. There she is forced to face issues of identity, race, rejection and belonging beyond that which she could ever have imagined. She must also face her birth family, who in turn must confront what happens when the baby you kill off at a mere six weeks old returns from the dead.
Something Out There: Stories
Nadine Gordimer - 1984
Contents: A city of the dead, a city of the living --At the rendezvous of victory --Letter from his father --Crimes of conscience --Sins of the third age --Blinder --Rags and bones --Terminal --A correspondence course --Something out there
African Slaver
Steve Braker - 2016
Just trying to clear the brutal shadows of the past from his mind, Brody’s next mission is clear: Spearfishing and Scuba Diving in warm clear tropical waters, with some cold beers on the beach. Living the dream… As Brody makes friends with the locals settling into the island retreat, his plans for peace and relaxation are suddenly shattered. After weeks of terrorizing the island paradise, a ruthless sea captain finally commits the unthinkable: he kidnaps a group of young girls from the village. Heartbroken and scared for the children, the people look to Brody for help.
Time is running out…
When Brody rallies the villagers to form a rescue team, he realizes he is the only one with the skills for this kind of work. With nothing but basic weapons and a sailing boat, Brody feels the weight of the dire situation. The lives of the girls are on the line, with the slave markets of Somalia only days away, the clock is ticking. Brody leads his ragtag crew across the rough and lawless ocean, knowing they are the only hope for the young girls. Once Special Forces, always Special Forces, he’s got this! With Brody at the helm, they’ll find the girls or die trying.
This is the first in this exciting Action Adventure Series...
The Mandela Plot
Kenneth Bonert - 2018
Young Martin Helger is the struggling odd duck at an elite private boys school in Johannesburg, with his father a rough-handed scrap dealer and his brother a mysterious legend.When a beautiful and manipulative American arrives at the family home, Martin soon finds himself wrenched out of his isolated bubble and thrust into the raw heart of the struggle. At the same time, secrets from the past begin to emerge and old sins long buried return in terrifying new ways, tearing at the Helgers, a second-generation Jewish family, even as the larger forces of history and politics tear apart the country as a whole. Mercy is in short supply and ultimately Martin must rely on alternative strengths to protect himself and fight for a better future.From the acclaimed author of the National Jewish Book Award–winning debut novel The Lion Seeker, The Mandela Plot is at once a riveting literary thriller, a moving coming of age tale, and an unforgettable journey through a world that entertains and terrifies in equal measure, and holds profound resonance for the present moment.
Zambezi
Tony Park - 2005
The victim, Miranda Banks-Lewis, was their daughter, protegee and lover respectively. Desperate to find out what happened to Miranda, Jed and Christine, with the help of a determined Australian journalist, set out on a perilous journey of discovery in Africa. Forced to pit themselves against the continent's dangers, they will also learn shocking truths about the woman they thought they knew. A superb successor to the bestselling Far Horizon, Zambezi is an unputdownable novel of love, loyalty, betrayal and revenge set against the magnificence and terror of Africa.
Debbie Go Home
Alan Paton - 1961
Short stories set in the South Africa of Alan Paton's "Cry The Beloved Country"Stories:Debbie Go Home; Ha'penny; The Divided House; Life for a Life;Death of a Tsotsi; The Worst Thing of his Life; The Waste Land; A Drink in the Passage; Sponono; The Elephant-Shooter
Cry, the Beloved Country: A Novel of South Africa: (A Study)
Edward Callan - 1991
Tennis and the Masai
Nicholas Best - 1987
Drop him into a ghastly Kenya prep school in the middle of Rider Haggard country. A school where cricketing news comes by carrier pigeon, leopards are assaulted with a red-hot poker, and runaway boys are hunted down with spearmen and a pack of foxhounds... For Martin Riddle, the experience is unforgettable. For the riding mistress, Lady Bullivant, it is all part of the day's work. And for the headmaster, a disreputable ex-Guards officer, it is simply a means of staving off bankruptcy for a few more weeks. As for the Masai, tennis may be on the curriculum at Haggard Hall, but midnight meetings with naked warriors definitely are not! 'The funniest book I have read since David Lodge's Small World' - Sunday Times 'Wickedly funny' - Daily Mail 'Less savage than Evelyn Waugh, Best is every bit as sharp... an immensely enjoyable book' - Evening Standard 'Very good entertainment' - Sir Alec Guinness (Sunday Times book of the year) Nicholas Best's books have been translated into many languages. He was the Financial Times's fiction critic for ten years and was long-listed in 2010 for the Sunday Times-EFG Bank 30,000 award, the biggest short story prize in the world. For more details, see www.nicholasbest.co.uk
Age of Iron
J.M. Coetzee - 1990
A classics professor, Mrs. Curren has been opposed to the lies and brutality of apartheid all her life, but has lived insulated from its true horrors. Now she is suddenly forced to come to terms with the iron-hearted rage that the system has wrought. In an extended letter addressed to her daughter, who has long since fled to America, Mrs. Curren recounts the strange events of her dying days. She witnesses the burning of a nearby black township and discovers the bullet-riddled body of her servant's son. A teenage black activist hiding in her house is killed by security forces. And through it all, her only companion, the only person to whom she can confess her mounting anger and despair, is a homeless man, an alcoholic, who one day appears on her doorstep. Brilliantly crafted and resonant with metaphor, Age of Iron is "a superbly realized novel whose truths cut to the bone." (The New York Times Book Review)
Into The Lion's Den
Martin Chimes - 2015
Ben will stop at nothing to save his son, but what awaits him is an evil, more dangerous and insidious than he could have ever anticipated. Into the Lion’s Den is a fast-paced action thriller, a compelling saga of the love of family and the indomitable will to survive in the face of an implacable malevolence.
Song of the Wind
Madge Swindells - 1985
When her mother is shot at the close of World War II, Marika Magos is orphaned into a new life in the diamond canyons of South Africa. As a worn-torn Europe is on the mend, Marika climbs to the glittering heights of the London fashion industry. From Paris to New York, her name is known and her admirers many. Not even Tony Palma, the international tycoon who thought he possessed her entirely knows of the secret passion she harbours for Swiss immigrant Gunter Grieff. Yet the sweet promise of their affair turns to ashes when Marika learns that his name and papers are false, changed in the final days of the war to protect his German identity. Song of the Wind tells a powerful tale of romance, adventure and intrigue. Praise for Song of the Wind ‘Irresistible . . . keeps your emotions trembling over hundreds of pages’ - MAIL ON SUNDAY Praise for Madge Swindells Praise for Madge Swindells 'Superlative' - Publishers Weekly 'I was gripped from start to finish’ - Kate Alexander, author ‘Terrific. A book that’s big in every sense. . . rich in detail and written with passion it lives on in the memory. I loved it’ - Sarah Harrison, author Madge Swindells was born and educated in England. As a teenager, she emigrated to South Africa where she studied archaeology at Cape Town University. Later, in England, she was a Fleet Street journalist and the manager of her own publishing company. Her earlier novels, Summer Harvest, Shadows on the Snow, The Corsican Woman, Edelweiss, The Sentinel and Harvesting the Past were international bestsellers and have been translated into eight languages. She lives in South Africa.
Wealth for all Africans: How Every African Can Live the Life of Their Dreams
Idowu Koyenikan - 2014
To build and manage your wealth, you must look at your situation holistically: build your character, standards, dreams, goals, and personal aspirations from the inside out. By developing both self-sufficiency and a connection with your community, it is possible to create wealth for yourself no matter who you are, what you do, or where you come from.
The Ones with Purpose
Nozizwe Cynthia Jele - 2018
My older sister Fikile’s last breath before she dies is nothing of the sort. There is no rattling noise at the back of her throat. No relentless twitching. No clinging to life. Fikile dies with no more fuss than a switch of a light bulb.” With her sister, Fikile, dead from breast cancer, her father long gone, her mother emerging from years of slumber, and her younger brother, Mbuso, consumed with rage that refuses to settle, Anele Mabuza has no choice but to collect herself and grow up. Or does she? Because, if truth be told, she has not signed up to be her family's caretaker. Surely her dreams are valid? The Ones with Purpose is a remarkable story of family, disappointment, sacrifice, forgiveness, and love.