It hasn’t been a great week for struggling actor Arnold Prinsloo. His career has hit rock bottom, he’s about to be evicted from his cottage in Melville, and worst of all, Zelda, the love of his life, has finally run out of patience and left him.

But when Arnold is accused of murdering insurance billionaire JP Mulder, his problems are only just starting.

Now, Arnold must tackle the greatest and most dangerous acting role of his life: pretending to be a hard-boiled East Rand detective in a race against time to clear his name, win back Zelda, and finally take off these way-too-tight polyester pants.

The curtain is rising …

The results of the 29 May 2024 elections caused a seismic shift in South Africa’s political landscape. For the first time in three decades of democracy, the ruling ANC did not emerge with a majority.

With a constitutional deadline of just fourteen days to elect a president, the nation held its breath. Would the ANC forge a so-called doomsday coalition with the EFF and Patriotic Alliance, or a centrist partnership with its nemesis, the DA? What role would smaller parties play, and how would Jacob Zuma’s disruptive MK party impact on the negotiations?

The Deal takes you behind the scenes of the negotiations that redefined a nation, providing exclusive interviews with party leaders, unique insights and stories, thoughtful analysis and vital context. From the exclusive Inanda Club to clandestine hotel basements and affluent private houses on Johannesburg’s Westcliff Ridge, negotiating teams met under immense pressure. Amidst volatile markets, a skittish currency and intense social media scrutiny, every decision was critical.

Witness the nail-biting moments as talks through bilaterals and back channels teetered on the brink of collapse, and discover the personality clashes, factionalism and deft political manoeuvring that ultimately led to the establishment of the Government of National Unity. The Deal is a compelling record of history.

On 23 August 2021, Babita Deokaran – a hardworking single mother and chief accountant at the Gauteng Department of Health – was shot down in a hail of bullets outside her home in Mondeor, Johannesburg. She had just dropped off her daughter at school. The izinkabi paid to kill her were caught, but the question remained: Who ordered her murder, and why?

Investigative journalist Jeff Wicks set out to find the answer. This quest would profoundly change – even endanger – his life, as he bravely followed the leads Babita had left behind. Leads that the Hawks, who were officially investigating her assassination, had failed to act on.

In The Shadow State Wicks uncovers an audacious web of crooked officials, criminal syndicates and ANC politicians, siphoning away billions meant for patients in Gauteng’s public hospitals. An explosive, fast-paced investigation into greed and state capture, this book is also a moving tribute to the courage of one woman who, when confronted by powerful wrongdoers, refused to keep quiet.

A comedy about a group of book lovers who literally lose the plot.

Norma Jacobs is your average accountant, running a book club on Facebook and living quietly with her boyfriend in London. Except for the part where she’s being threatened by a deranged author and questioned by the police about attempted murder. All just as she’s started a new job as the only forty-two-yearold intern in the history of publishing.

Harry Shields is a crime writer desperate to hit the big time when a negative review of his latest book on Norma’s page results in him having a spectacular public meltdown. He gets cancelled, his events get cancelled, and before you can say ‘author behaving badly’, he’s plotting revenge and stalking his nemesis. By the time Harry’s gone viral, and Norma’s given up trying to stop him, the online book club has over a hundred thousand rowdy members, and the comments section is a (literal) riot. Entertaining until one member ends up
in a coma.

A savagely funny satire about online media and cancel culture for everyone who thinks books are harmless. With elements of The Echo Chamber and The Jane Austen Book Club, this hilarious novel is for all those who love reading, social media and rum-and-raisin ice cream.

In Tasneem’s close-knit Muslim Indian community the stigma of divorce is a heavy burden to carry, and her mother insists on finding her a husband – even if it means orchestrating a traditional ‘samoosa run’.

When she meets Aadil, an unexpected connection sparks and they strike a deal: a pretend engagement to keep their families off their backs.

But a simple ruse soon grows complicated because one of them is hiding a life-changing secret . . .

On New Year's Eve in 1987, lightning kills Nate's and Danny's mother. To deal with the loss and make sense of a world seemingly governed by chance, their distant and eccentric father creates the Nicotine Gospel.

"According to him, an eight by five cardboard box containing somewhere near twenty machine-made cigarettes would tell you all you needed to know about a man."

The boys throw themselves into the lessons to be close to their dad, but as nate grows up and begins to understand how strange the family gospel (and their father) truly is, he starts to worry. While Nate excels at school and finds ways to escape their father's neglect and the increasingly ramshackle house in Durban, Danny seems to revel in courting danger and death.

Decades later, upon learning of their father's death, Nate and Danny, long estranged, decide to drive from Durban to Cape Town to attend the funeral. On the journey, they must confront each other and their troubled past to find a way forward.

Between 1960 and 1989 in South Africa, more than 130 people were executed for crimes that had a political motive. Who were they, what did they do, and why did they do it?

While many people have heard of Solomon Mahlangu, John Harris or even Vuyisile Mini, the vast majority of executed activists remain very much unknown, even though they paid the ultimate price for their actions.

This book tells their stories, drawing on the author’s interviews with fellow activists, the families left behind, lawyers on both sides, judges who passed sentence, warders on death row, and even functionaries tasked with informing the condemned of their impending fate.

In the process, the book sheds light on forgotten aspects of South African history, such as the actions of the PAC/Poqo in the 1960s, which resulted in dozens of executions, and people who heeded the ANC’s call to make the country ungovernable in the 1980s and who were then disowned by the organisation. The book also makes startling revelations about miscarriages of justice, defence attorneys working against their clients, and, sadly, the post-apartheid state’s neglect of those who suffered as a result of political executions.

Since the Zuma presidency weakened crime intelligence, violent crime surged, with murder rates rising over 75%. South Africa faces severe femicide, and most murderers evade justice. Prisons fail by perpetuating crime; harsher sentences do not help.

Edwin Cameron, after visiting prisons, advocates for reform. Along with colleagues, he suggests abolishing minimum sentences, cash bail, and decriminalizing drug use to improve safety and justice.

When not caring for his ailing mother, twenty-three-year-old Damon can be found swimming laps at the Sea Point Pavillion. Here he meets the confident Nico, who immediately charms him back to his home. Damon is torn between dealing with his mother’s terminal illness and keeping his sexuality a secret from her. His desire to be truthful is tested when her health takes a turn for the worse, forcing him to choose between his young lover and an unspeakable promise to help end her life.

A tender portrait of caregiving, the longing for intimacy and the heartbreak of letting go, Salt Water Pool Boy is a sensual exploration of love and loss charting a young man’s journey from Cape Town to Rome to Paris, from working on a film set in Cinecittà and obsessing over a male prostitute, to trying to salvage his long-term relationship by searching for intimacy in a string of one-night stands.

When a casual hookup threatens to open old wounds, Damon realises he has yet to fully come to terms with his troubled past.

Once upon a time, a young girl Song ventured into a dark forest, looking for a cure for her much-loved elder sister ...

A touching, tender and lyrical fable about what we do for the ones we love, and the beauty and mystery of being alive in a world where we are a part of everything, and everything is a part of us.

As a terrible pandemic rages through the small medieval hamlet of Villingraz, a young girl, Estie, accompanied by her goat Isabel, sets off into the forest, in search of a cure for her sister who is infected with the pox. Her father Merdocai has surrendered himself to the evil Marquis to be experimented upon for the Greater Good; and with her mother long dead, all Estie has to keep her going is the love of her sister, her father and her friend Rainer, a stuttering poet.

As Estie ventures deeper into the forest, she encounters creatures and teachers who hold the answers to all the questions she has about who she is, and where she has come from. Meanwhile, out in the depths of the ocean, a whale is returning to the place he was born, to exhale his last breath. While Estie does not know this, he too holds secrets that belong to Estie's story. The Whale's Last Song is a touching, tender fable, a parable what we must sacrifice for those we love; a rumination on the tragic mistakes in every life - and the steadfastness that is required to overcome those mistakes - and a love song to the natural world.

For over three decades, the remarkable story of Umkhonto we Sizwe’s Special Operations Unit has remained largely untold. Formed under the direct command of ANC president Oliver Tambo and senior ANC and SACP leader Joe Slovo, this elite unit executed some of the most daring and high-profile attacks against the apartheid state in the 1980s. From the spectacular 1980 Sasol bombings to the 1987 attack at the Wits Command, Special Ops was at the forefront of the armed struggle, targeting strategic economic and military sites with precision and determination.

In this groundbreaking book, the history of Special Ops is brought to life through the voices of its surviving participants. Based on interviews with 48 individuals, this oral history offers an intimate and comprehensive look at the unit's operations, challenges, and achievements. Also drawing from press reports, TRC records and official documents, the narrative provides a balanced assessment of the political context, role, and significance of Special Ops within the broader ANC-led national liberation struggle.

Attacking the Heart of Apartheid is an essential read for anyone interested in the history of the anti-apartheid struggle, the dynamics of armed resistance, and the power of collective action in the pursuit of justice and equality.

In this intimate memoir, Hannah Botsis chronicles life as a minister's daughter in post-apartheid South Africa.

Through the lens of her father's forty-year ministry at a Presbyterian church in Cape Town's northern suburbs, she explores faith, family, and racial privilege with unflinching honesty.

A meditation on grace and belonging, this story illuminates how communities navigate change while wrestling with their complicated histories.

This book is a journey of triumph and setback, of building something good in a world that doesn’t always welcome it. It’s about allies and adversaries, mentors and obstacles. Above all, it’s a story driven by social justice and the power of education to change lives and the resilience it takes to protect that power when it’s most at risk. A fascinating South African memoir that shares a story of hope and resilience.

At school, James Urdang was a troublemaking underachiever. Diagnosed with ADHD and Dyslexia at an early age, few could have imagined he’d go on to found Education Africa, an organisation that has helped educate thousands of young black South Africans.

Supported and mentored by Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela and Dr. Aggrey Klaaste − former Editor-in-Chief of The Sowetan – who became the organisation’s first chairman in 1992 − James, driven by determination and sheer audacity made his dream a reality. Until one day it all came crashing down as he faced a gruelling battle to save his NPO, Education Africa, from a hostile takeover by executives from a global financial institution.

Maks Ntaka has a target on his back.

After years of loyal work for Arms-Tech Industries, Maks has found proof of serious corruption in his department. Tender fraud, illegal kickbacks, inflated contracts, the same old story. Maks wants to do something about it, turn whistleblower. What else can a good man do?

But who can he tell if he can’t trust anyone? The people in charge seem complicit, while the rest turn a blind eye. Soon suspicions cloud the office, and all the knives are out for whoever turns on them first. As Maks pre-pares his disclosures, he discovers that his longtime mentor has implicated him in the illegalities. Not only is he being set up by his company, but some foreign nationals with deep pockets are also on his trail looking for their cut. For Maks, the walls are closing in, and danger waits at every turn.

Meanwhile, his own private indiscretions are coming to light, and soon his life starts collapsing around him.

In this compelling and harrowing account of a whistleblower, Onke Mazibuko creates a nail-biting, paranoid thriller about a good man pushed to the limit. Drawing from all too real instances of corruption and collapse, this book shows what such a system does to those who still listen to their conscience.

What is a good man to do when your own company made the bullet with your name on it?

A memoir by South African musician, journalist, filmmaker and author Roger Lucey, in which he describes building a house in the mountains of the Breede River Valley as a way of healing the darkness of his past and reclaiming his creativity.

Roger Lucey survived a covert security police campaign which destroyed his music career. He survived the drug addiction and disaffection which followed. He survived a decade and a half as a cameraman documenting the wars of Africa and Eastern Europe.

Survival was not enough though. Broken and despairing, he needed to find a way to reclaim his life and creativity.

A creative reimagining of a true crime story from early-1970s South Africa.

The novel tells the story of teenager Lorraine van Niekerk who despises the fact that her boss and lover, middle-aged André Bekker, won’t leave his wife Sunette and marry her instead. When Lorraine’s life fatefully intersects that of Alfie Geemooi, a recent amputee, she comes up with a hell of a plan.

Is murder an adequate price to pay for love?

This book describes the anguish of men battling with mental health issues and reflections from the people who treat them.

Marion Scher weaves together the stories of South African men who have confronted their mental health issues with the stories the doctors who treat them have to tell. It gives practical guidance on where men (and their friends and families) can turn for help in overcoming the ever-increasing scourge of mental illness in our society.

Marion Scher is a well-known SA mental health journalist and has done pro bono work for SADAG for over 30 years.

Across oceans and centuries, this sweeping narrative shuttles between the corridors of the Colonial Office in London, the contested streets of Durban, and the growing sway of Delhi. At its core are the untold struggles of Indian South Africans, communities who, in the shadow of empire, fought to resist the ever-present threat of repatriation.

From the marble halls of the British Raj and the machinations of Indian Agent-Generals to the solemn exodus of newly freed indentured labourers leaving Natal’s plantations, the story illuminates histories long obscured. It captures in haunting detail in family biographies, the rise of a merchant class, daring to outpace their colonial rivals, only to face relentless hostility for their audacity.

Drawing on fresh research, the book weaves together seismic events, the independence of India, the rise of South Africa’s National Party, and their ominous promise of mass expulsions, with the texture of everyday life. The 1960s bring upheaval as the Group Areas Act rips communities from their roots, yet out of this turmoil, new townships nurture a generation of educated children and professionals, forging hope in unexpected places. Rejecting easy narratives, the book delves into the messy, human spaces between accommodation and resistance, where principle and strategy, triumph and muddling through contest, as much as they coexist.

In its final chapters, the fall of apartheid offers a moment of transcendence. Yet it also asks: what does it mean, at last, to belong? Ultimately, this is a story about the price and promise of belonging. Through its unflinching gaze at struggle and survival, it becomes a book not just for Indian South Africans, but for anyone who has ever sought a place to call home.

An Icelandic volcano has thrown an ash cloud into the atmosphere and, across the world, planes have stopped flying. Overhead, the skies are severely blue. Leah Nash and Niall Lawrence, twenty-somethings in love, grow strangely restless. They set out on different but parallel pathways. He takes on work at an Antarctic polar station and experiences the strange and lonely beauty of the precarious ice-world. She studies writing in England and struggles to find her way. They are both determined to stay together, though separated by thousands of miles.

Elleke Boehmer’s Ice Shock is a love story set against the backdrop of the melting ice caps. The novel asks what it is to be close even when we are far apart—distant yet proximate. How do we go on loving each other when the environment around us is changing catastrophically by the day?’

Set in the Cape Colony during the brutal era of slavery, Song of the Slave Girl is a gripping tale of love, resilience, and survival.

Meraj and Djameela, two young slaves, are bound by a love so powerful that it defies the cruelty of their masters. When Djameela is sold to a distant farmer, Meraj is consumed by grief, spiraling into madness. His anguish turns to fury after one final act of abuse, leading him to kill his master and flee to Zandvliet, a refuge for runaway slaves.

Djameela, now in a new home, faces her own battles as she fends off the advances of her new master’s son. Guided by the wisdom of enslaved women versed in ancient magic from the East Indies, she learns to defend herself and plots her escape. Desperate to reunite, both lovers take bold steps to find each other. But as fugitives from the law, their rekindled passion is haunted by the threat of capture.

In a heart-pounding journey of defiance, Song of the Slave Girl explores the boundaries of love and freedom, ending with an ambiguous finale that invites readers to imagine their fate. Will love triumph, or will their fight for freedom come at too great a cost?

A gripping story of power, ambition, and the price of desire.

From the bustling township of Mamelodi to the heart of European diplomacy in Brussels, Mbali Langa has fought for every opportunity – and sacrificed more than she cares to admit. As a rising diplomat with a sharp mind and an unwavering ambition, she is no stranger to the delicate balance of power and persuasion.

But when an illicit affair threatens to shatter her career, and hidden enemies begin to close in, she finds herself trapped in a game where trust is a luxury she can’t afford. In Brussels, behind the polished façades of diplomacy, lies a dangerous world of secrets, betrayals and high-stakes deception – where one wrong move could cost her everything.

Caught between duty, love and the weight of her past, Mbali must decide just how far she’s willing to go to secure the future she’s always dreamed of.

Jan Smuts is revered by some as a national and international statesman, but he is condemned by others as an architect of segregation. In his new book, prize-winning author Bongani Ngqulunga examines Smuts’s political life in terms of how it affected black people.

He considers the impact of Smuts’s role in the treaty ending the Anglo-Boer War and the National Convention that created the Union of South Africa. He follows Smuts’s actions as a minister under Louis Botha, as prime minister from 1919 to 1924 and again from 1939 to 1948, and his relationship with Barry Hertzog’s National Party, first in opposition and then in a fused South African Party. Ngqulunga concentrates on the events and policies that affected black people directly, and he presents the views of people such as Sol Plaatje, Alfred Xuma, John Dube, D.D.T. Jabavu and Z.K. Matthews – and, later on, Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu. He shows how Smuts evolved in his views, eventually coming to recognise that segregation had failed. But the reforms he introduced in the 1940s were too little, too late, and were swept away by the National Party and its policy of apartheid.

Giving a balanced view that is both respectful and critical, Under Smuts’s Rule is a vital addition to the literature on Smuts and to South African history.

A poignant tale of self-discovery, love, and community set against the backdrop of post-apartheid South Africa.

The story follows Unathi’s journey as she searches for her mother, Mavis, while navigating her identity. Raised by her grandmother, Gogo, in the village of Moya, where mothers are eerily absent, Unathi must confront the complexities of her sexuality, cultural heritage, and sense of belonging.

As she explores lesbian love, interracial relationships, and the quest for her mother’s truth, Unathi must also contend with the harsh realities of identity politics and the masks she must wear to survive.

A road trip to Namibia unfolds across these pages, but when? Yesterday, years ago, or never at all? Barbara Adair refuses to say, creating something between memoir and fever dream.

This is no ordinary travel narrative. Language shifts without warning: playful one moment, brutal the next. The text overflows with names of rivers, flowers, trees, places, and people, then suddenly confronts the cruel realities of history and contemporary life. Nothing stays still long enough for comfort.

Here is freedom captured in words: wind, mythology, politics, life and death all tumbling together. Questions emerge about technology, mechanics, the vacuous nature of our existence. The reader can never settle into complacency.

Mark Kannemeyer's eerie illustrations enhance or deliberately undermine the text, offering visual refuge from the relentless verbal energy.

Non-linear, indulgent, challenging: this book demonstrates how language can be bent into new shapes, how stories can become something more than mere storytelling. Fun, sad, and occasionally repellent. Often all at once.

Ellie Kent longs to belong

Abandoned as a child and raised in the bleak confines of an asylum, Ellie is taken into service as a governess by a family bound for the distant colony of South Africa. But before reaching their destination, she is abandoned once more – cast adrift in a land as vast as it is unforgiving.

Left with no choice but to join a caravan of settlers, Ellie finds herself in the company of a questionable trader, a mysterious opera singer, and a young Afrikaner, Gysbert de Boer, tasked with delivering her safely to an uncertain future. As war brews on the horizon and the settlers struggle for survival in a land that offers little mercy, Ellie must carve out a home – or be lost to the wilderness forever.

A sweeping frontier fable, The Immortalites is a masterfully crafted tale of survival, sacrifice, and the search for belonging.