When Stephen Clingman was two, he underwent an operation to remove a birthmark under his right eye. The operation failed, and the birthmark returned, but in somewhat altered form.

In this captivating and beguiling book, Clingman takes the fact of that mark – its appearance, disappearance and return – as a guiding motif of memory. This is how we remember the worlds we are born into, how they become a set of images in the mind, surfacing and resurfacing across time and space. South Africa under apartheid was itself governed by the markings of birth – the accidents of colour, race, and skin. But what were the effects on the mind?

Here a further motif comes into play, for in the operation Stephen’s vision was affected, and his eyes came to see differently from one another: divided vision in a divided world. How, in these circumstances, can we come to a deeper kind of vision, how can we achieve wholeness, acceptance, find our place in the midst of turmoil and change?

In an enchanting and cumulative narrative set on three continents, Stephen’s memories make up the hologram of the book’s subtitle. It is a story that is personal, painful, comic, and ultimately uplifting: a book not so much of the coming of age, but the coming of perspective.

In December 2017, Walter Meyer was stabbed in the heart with a kitchen knife by his wife, Sophia. Dubbed "South Africa's own van Gogh" and critically acclaimed as the finest landscape artist to emerge from this country in the last century, his brutal death left a deep void.

Written by his brother, Frans, along with rare insights from Walter's rehab journals, Impossible Skies explores the artist's roots, his genius as a painter and a poignant relationship between two brothers.

Journalist Lesley Mofokeng investigates the life of his remarkable grandfather, Mongangane Wilfred Mofokeng, a prominent Dutch Reformed Church evangelist, who built a thriving community out of the dust of the far Northwest.

The journey takes him from Joburg’s Marabi-soaked townships of the 1930s to his childhood home of Gelukspan near Lichtenburg and then to the rural Free State and the remote mountain kingdom of Lesotho. In what becomes a spiritual quest, he traces the inspirational footsteps of his ancestors and the legendary King Moshoeshoe.

In the process, Mofokeng proudly claims his heritage and also uncovers a long-lost chapter of South African history and the church of the apartheid regime.

Hierdie is 'n biografie in konteks en lees soos 'n roman.

Die jaar is 1700, die plek Amsterdam. Die bruid is 21 jaar oud en inderhaas getroud met 'n wewenaar wat oud genoeg is om haar pa te wees. Wie is die Franse vrou wat kans sien vir 'n pionierslewe op 'n verre voorpos? Marie Buisset is 'n vlugteling, 'n weeskind uit Sedan, Frankryk, gebore tydens die felste Hugenootvervolging. Sy word die stammoeder van die families Du Plessis en Smith in Suid-Afrika. As vroedvrou - later op die loonlys van die VOC - word Marie (later genoem Maria) die hulp van die kwesbares: 'n verkragte meisietjie, 'n tiener wat geboorte gee en verskeie vroue wat deur hul eienaars, minnaars of eggenote verniel is.

Die leser ontmoet talle bekende name in die Suid-Afrikaanse geskiedenis. Dis 'n verhaal van politieke stryd, ontbering, politiek en liefde. Dis 'n storie oor mense en die uitdagings wat hulle aanpak.

Uit skrapse oorblyfsels soos hofverslae, mediese rekeninge, veilings en testament onthul Joan Kruger 'n ryk en boeiende verhaal, vol humor en patos. Wieg: die verhaal van Maria du Plessis, née Buisset, (1679 - 1751) Hugenoot en vroedvrou is a vonds vir historici en lesers wat nuwe lig werp op 'n gedeelde verlede. 'n Kragtoer.

Eben Etzebeth is the most-capped player in South African rugby history. A towering lock, his intelligence, energy and aggression on the pitch is feared, respected, often imitated but never matched.

He is the heart and soul of a historically successful Springbok team and a key part of their astonishingly successful run that encompasses two consecutive World Cups and a current two-year-stint at the top of the world rankings. In this frank and disarming account, Eben uncovers the key factors in his extraordinary success, and how he keeps focussed, both on and off the pitch. From his humble beginnings in Goodwood, a Cape Town suburb where nothing came easy, through his early club career and on to his hard-won place within the South African squad, UNLOCKED reveals the personal side of an astonishing professional career.

This is an inspiring story of a man who has led from the front, and played against the best in the world.

A Dangerous Love is an exhilarating, true love story that plays out in the chaos and lawlessness of the political turmoil that was South Africa in the late 80s and early 90s. The mayhem and desperation of a country whose social fabric is unravelling is mirrored in Karen Daniels’s own life, and hers is an up-close-and-personal account of life as a young woman of colour in the anarchy of early post-apartheid South Africa.

Karen Daniels was only 21 when she met Martin, a mysterious, dangerous man who, at 22 years of age, had the world at his feet. Captivated by this man, she was soon caught up in a love affair that turned into obsession and violence. Gutsy and charming, Martin wasn’t born into a life of crime and drugs, but his greed and passion soon pulled him into the underworld and he was overcome by a darkness he could not escape.

Hold your breath as Karen takes you with her on a roller-coaster ride into an abyss of armed heists, crime, and violent abuse. Her story shows how having such intense and conflicting emotions for a man – loving him and being petrified of him – is only a few heartbeats away from hate.

Karen’s eventual escape from this life is a success story that has taken her to the heights of the corporate world, and encouraged her to become an advocate for human rights and women empowerment. Her story is one of human resilience, courage and determination. It offers hope to those struggling to break free from their circumstances, and will inspire anyone who wants to live their best life and go from surviving to thriving.

"A tightly coiled story of obsession and crime that plays out in an era of lawlessness" - Terry-Ann Adams, author of Those Who Live in Cages.

South Africa’s pre-eminent historian explains the spectacular rise – and probable demise – of the numerical minority that dominated 20th-century South Africa.

The Afrikaners are unique in the world in that they successfully mobilised ethnic entrepreneurship without state assistance, controlled the entire country, and then yielded power without military defeat. Award-winning author Hermann Giliomee takes a hard analytical look at this group’s dramatic ascent and possible disappearance as a nation in a series of well-argued thematic chapters. Topics range from ethnic entrepreneurship, the ‘coloured vote’ and ‘Bantu’ education to Nelson Mandela’s relationship with the last Afrikaner leaders.

It ends with a final chapter on the most likely future for this sometimes admired, often reviled group, which undoubtedly left the largest imprint on South African history in the 20th century.

Mapetla Mohapi was a leading member of the Black Consciousness Movement, and the first to die in detention in 1976. Police produced a 'suicide note'. The note was later confirmed by a British expert as a forgery. Since then, his wife Nohle has worked tirelessly for justice.

Zikhona Valela traces the politics of the time, the convergence of biographies that led to the brutal and tragic death of Mapetla Mohapi, and the effects on Nohle and the Mohapi family.

A shocking and necessary book.

Eben Etzebeth is tans die speler wat al die meeste toetswedstryde in die Suid-Afrikaanse rugbygeskiedenis gespeel het. Op die veld word hierdie ellelange slot se intelligensie, energie en aggressie gevrees, gerespekteer en dikwels nageboots – maar hy bly ongeëwenaard. 
 
Hy is lid van die Springbokke se senior leierskapsgroep, en speel ’n deurslaggewende rol in ’n ongelooflik suksesverhaal wat twee agtereenvolgende Wêreldbekers insluit, asook die span se posisie boaan die wêreldranglys die afgelope twee jaar. 

In hierdie eerlike en onderhoudende vertelling beskryf Eben van die vernaamste faktore vir sy buitengewone sukses, en hoe hy gefokus bly – op en van die veld af. Van sy beskeie kinderjare in Goodwood – ’n voorstad van Kaapstad waar niks maklik kom nie – regdeur sy vroeë klubloopbaan, tot by sy swaar verdiende plek in die Suid-Afrikaanse nasionale span, vertel Ten slotte die verhaal van ’n merkwaardige sportloopbaan.

For more than five decades Walter and Albertina Sisulu were at the forefront of the struggle against apartheid. As secretary-general of the ANC, Walter was sentenced to life imprisonment with Nelson Mandela in 1964 and spent 26 years in prison until his release in 1989. While her husband and his colleagues were in jail, Albertina played a crucial role in keeping the ANC alive underground, and in the 1980s was co-President of the United Democratic Front. Their story has been one of persecution, bitter struggle and painful separation. But it is also one of patience, hope and enduring love.

The ultimate guide to mental toughness by James 'Iron Cowboy' Lawrence – the greatest endurance athlete in human history.

In 2015, Lawrence set his third Guinness World Record by completing fifty full-distance triathlons in fifty states in fifty consecutive days – a 2.4-mile swim, 112 miles on a bike, then a 26.2-mile run, all in under seventeen hours each day. Pushing himself further, in 2021 at the age of forty-five he set out to complete 100 triathlons in 100 days - a challenge so difficult that he wondered if he would survive it. By persevering, he hoped to inspire people to do the same for whatever difficulties they may be going through.

Lawrence has subjected his body to exhaustive physical testing, to every genetic analysis known to science. The stunning discovery is that, physically, he is unspecial in every way. The secret to his bulletproof body is his bulletproof mentality.

In this life-changing book he reveals how to:

• Say yes to opportunities
• Develop confidence
• Overcome obstacles holding you back
• Forge an iron will by making and keeping small promises
• Foster hope and resilience

Good Morning, Mr Mandela tells the extraordinary story of how Zelda la Grange’s life, beliefs and prejudices were transformed by the greatest statesman of our time.

It is the incredible journey of an awkward, terrified young typist in her twenties who was chosen to become Nelson Mandela’s most loyal servant, spending the greater part of her adult working life travelling with and caring for the man she would come to call ‘Khulu’.

This is a book about love and second chances. It will touch your life and make you believe that every one of us, no matter who we are or what we have done, has the power to change.

From California Governor Gavin Newsom (and a possible contender in the race for Democratic candidate in the 2028 Presidential election) comes an intimate and poignant account of identity, belonging, and the defining moments that inspired a life in politics.

‘Go slow,’ his political elders advised him, but Gavin Newsom has never known such a speed. For Newsom, the California Dream is what lured his father’s family from Ireland, six generations ago. His great-great-grandfather, a cop, walked a beat in San Francisco, where almost 150 years later Newsom would be elected as mayor.

Newsom has never lived anywhere but California. His childhood was spent being tugged between two worlds: his mother worked three jobs in order to care for her children while his father, a close friend of the Getty family, brought Newsom into a world of wealth and connections. But the vantage point was valuable: he inherited his mother’s perseverance and his father’s reverence of California – not only its wildness, but its opportunity.

In Young Man in a Hurry, Newsom traces the forces that have defined his ambitions as a politician. As mayor of San Francisco, he made waves when he violated state law in order to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. He launched bold efforts to counter climate change, improve mental health care, and enhance gun safety. Elected as governor and entering office into immediate hyper-partisan headwinds from Washington, DC, Newsom has constantly and consistently stuck his neck out.

Here, he reflects on the long journey that ultimately shaped him into one of the most recognizable and accomplished elected officials in America.

Two months into a planned solo source-to-sea navigation of the Amazon River, adventure Davey du Plessis was ambushed and shot within the isolated jungles of Peru.

The adventure turned into an intense moment-to-moment struggle to survive as he made his way, wounded, through the dense jungle, seeking rescue and safety.

Choosing To Live is Davey's personal account of his Amazon experience. He retells the remarkable story with an endearing openness, while sharing unique insights into the power of compassion and his ability to maintain motivation in his balance between life and death.

Sir Alex Ferguson's compelling story is always honest and revealing he reflects on his managerial career that embraced unprecedented European success for Aberdeen and 26 triumphant seasons with Manchester United.

Sir Alex Ferguson's best-selling autobiography has now been updated to offer reflections on events at Manchester United since his retirement as well as his teachings at the Harvard Business School, a night at the Oscars and a boat tour round the Hebrides, where he passed unrecognised.

The extra material adds fresh insights and detail on his final years as United's manager.

Both the psychology of management and the detail of football strategy at the top level can be complex matters but no-one has explained them in a more interesting and accessible way for the general reader than Sir Alex does here.

My Autobiography is revealing, endlessly entertaining and above all inspirational.

A moving journey of discovery into the unexplored continent that is often our families’ past. It can be read as a reconstruction of one’s own Jewish and at the same time European-South African roots, but through these micro-histories we arrive at the events of the Second World War and the Holocaust to the level of macro-history.

Egonne Roth’s work brilliantly illustrates the complex mechanism of intergenerational, communicative memory and cultural memory (described by Jan and Aleida Assmann, among others). On a feminist level, it is also a personal history of the daughter-father relationship, leading to a kind of purification, a catharsis.

The detective-like reconstruction of the multi-ethnic segments of the family’s history has as its backdrop the arduous completion of one’s own biography from scraps of documents, accounts of the now few witnesses, secrets, and traumas hidden for decades.

Christina Landman was nog altyd ’n voorloper. Sy is ook as onstuitbaar beskryf, iemand wat selfs ’n klip kan kwaadmaak.

Maar agter die oënskynlike harde dop skuil daar ’n vrou met ’n gul hart vir ander vroue en gemarginaliseerdes, ’n vrou wat dankbaar is vir die kanse wat sy in die akademie en kerk gekry het.

Hierdie is die verhaal van ’n moeder en ’n voorloper wat die weg gebaan het vir alle vroue, maar soveel meer, ’n verhaal van ’n vrou wat bly staan het – ’n seder.

Kylian Mbappé is a global football superstar. A world champion at the age of nineteen in Russia, the World Cup's Golden Boot four years later in Qatar, the first player to score a hat-trick in a World Cup final since Geoff Hurst in 1966, the winner of twelve major honours with Paris Saint-Germain. Mbappé is still only 26, wears the shirt of Real Madrid and is captain of France's national team.

At its core this book tells the ascent of a child of immigrants who rose to become the world's best player. But Mbappé's story is far more - his ascent was planned from the beginning, in a way no other sports career had been orchestrated before.

Kylian Mbappé's trajectory was mapped out from a very early age by his family, with the player's full consent. For Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi, the brand was developed as a consequence of their exceptional playing achievements. For Mbappé, the plan was in place before he'd played a minute of football with his first professional club, AS Monaco.

He was only six years old when Nike knocked on his parents' door and gave him his first sponsorship contract. His name was trademarked worldwide before he'd won his first cap for France. Every move, every decision has been calculated from the outset.

Yes, Mbappé is a generational talent, and an exceptionally smart individual who looks as much at ease at the Elysée palace as on the pitch. But what truly sets him apart is that he is not just a sportsman: he is a project. This book tells that story for the first time.

Lion Heart is the bold and uplifting memoir of Cam Whitnall, a man whose life has been defined by extraordinary bonds with wildlife and a dramatic warzone rescue that brought five lions to safety in the UK.

When Cam’s grandparents bought a dilapidated zoo, once known as the worst in the UK, and brought it back to life, they also created a home for their family.

Cam grew up on the grounds, now known as Hertfordshire Zoo, in a bedroom overlooking the tiger enclosure. His childhood playground, where he and his brothers would play hide-and-seek after hours, was filled with endangered species from around the world. He built deep connections with the animals in their care, even hand-rearing a lion cub called Zara, an experience which inspired a lifelong fascination with big cats.

Over the years, the family business expanded as they also took on The Big Cat Sanctuary with Cam taking the helm as director. He and the sanctuary made global headlines for leading a high-risk rescue mission of five abandoned lions from war-torn Ukraine. The lions were found in states of shellshock and malnourishment and had likely been used for illegal breeding. After ten months of dedicated effort, Cam united Rori, Yuna, Vanda, Amani and Lira in their forever home at the sanctuary and gave them the freedom to walk on grass for the very first time. A momentous milestone in a lifetime dedicated to animal welfare, conservation and rescue.

The deepest dive yet into the heart and soul, secret affairs, unexplored alliances, and bitter feuds of a generally worshipped, intermittently reviled American icon.

Perhaps no founding father is as mysterious as Thomas Jefferson. The author of the Declaration of Independence was both a gifted wordsmith and a bundle of nerves. His superior knowledge of the human heart is captured in the impassioned appeal he brought to the Declaration. But as a champion of the common man who lived a life of privilege on a mountaintop plantation of his own design, he has eluded biographers who have sought to make sense of his inner life. In Being Thomas Jefferson, acclaimed Jefferson scholar Andrew Burstein peels away layers of obfuscation, taking us past the veneer of the animated letter-writer to describe a confused lover and a misguided humanist, too timid to embrace antislavery.

Jefferson was a soft-spoken man who recoiled from direct conflict, yet a master puppeteer in politics. Whenever he left Monticello, where he could control his environment, he suffered debilitating headaches that plagued him for decades, until he finally retired from public life. So, what did it feel like to be Thomas Jefferson? Burstein explains the decision to take as his mistress Sally Hemings, the enslaved half-sister of his late wife, who bore him six children, none of whom he acknowledged.

Presenting a society that encouraged separation between public and private, appearance and essence, Burstein paints a dramatic picture of early American culture and brings us closer to Jefferson's life and thought than ever before.

Petula Clark's first appearance on the airwaves was in 1942, aged nine, singing on a BBC radio show that broadcast messages to the troops. It was to be the start of the longest career of any British entertainer, as she evolved from child star to music, film and theatre legend.

After a string of hit records in the UK in the 50s, Petula followed her heart and future husband to France where she became the nation's most popular female vocalist, before going truly global when she topped the charts in the US with Downtown. Hollywood beckoned, then Vegas, Broadway and the West End.

Petula is an artist who has always had an innate ability to create deep connections with audiences everywhere, remaining beloved and relevant across different eras. In her first and only autobiography, she brings that same personal passion and spirit to her writing, with a witty, sparkling and deeply intimate narrative.

She confides in us with glorious showbiz gems, such as the time she saw Frank Sinatra at both his most charming and his most intimidating, or there's the day she attended Liza Minelli and David Gest's wedding as one of thirteen maids of honour, all dressed in black.

While beneath the shiny surface, she also reflects on the people and moments that shaped her, on love and loss, on the family life she cherished away from the spotlight and, ultimately, on finding her own path to happiness and fulfilment.

Find out why John Lennon, at his bed-in for peace with Yoko, asked 'Is that You, Petula?' It was. And this is Petula, a true icon of popular music, telling you her story, in her own words.

The definitive biography of Rory McIlroy, the most important, popular and confounding player of the post-Tiger era.

Rory McIlroy contains multitudes. He can overwhelm a golf course with his transcendent talent and then, at the next tournament, look utterly lost. McIlroy is golf’s most eloquent ambassador and a trash-talking troll, sometimes in the same press conference. The child of a working-class family from a small town in a war-torn homeland now commutes to work in his own private jet and counts billionaires as confidants. A dozen years ago, McIlroy asked Alan Shipnuck a question about the player he had modeled himself after, Tiger Woods: ‘What’s he really like?’ As McIlroy enters the last act of his highly eventful career, this book is a chance to redirect that old question and try to understand a man of deep complexity and contradictions.

McIlroy’s victory at the 2025 Masters packed such an emotional punch because he is golf’s most vulnerable superstar. Across two decades as a pro he has been the anti-Tiger, letting fans into his heart and into his world. When McIlroy collapsed onto the final green at Augusta National, having at last completed the career Grand Slam, golf fans cried along with him because so many saw themselves in his struggles.

But there is much that the public does not know about McIlroy. With reporting chops honed across thirty years on the golf beat, Shipnuck traces McIlroy’s evolution from a young phenom in Northern Ireland to a game-changing force on and off the golf course. Shipnuck has shadowed McIlroy throughout his career, and he brings to life all the heartbreaks and triumphs with thrilling immediacy and unparalleled access. Tabloid romance, bitter business disputes, divisive politicking – it is all part of this portrait of a man in full.

Shipnuck has long been known as the most fearless writer on the golf beat, and he goes deep into McIlroy’s personal history at a time when the spotlight on Rory has never been brighter.

In March 2016, Mosilo Mothepu was appointed CEO of Trillian Financial Advisory, a subsidiary of Gupta-linked Trillian Capital Partners. The prospect of being at the helm of a black-owned financial consultancy was electrifying for a black woman whose twin passions were transformation and empowering women. Three months later, suffering from depression and insomnia, she resigned with no other job lined up.

In October 2016, a written statement handed to Public Protector Thuli Madonsela detailing Trillian’s involvement in state capture was leaked to the media. Key to the disclosures were the removals of finance ministers Nhlanhla Nene and Pravin Gordhan from their posts due to the Guptas’ influence. Although she was not identified by name as the source of the affidavit, details of the revelations published in the Sunday Times left no doubt in the minds of Trillian’s executives: Mothepu was the Nenegate whistleblower.

Despite fearing legal consequences, Mothepu had decided that she could not just stand by as the country burnt. Her disclosures resulted in the freezing of Trillian-associated company Regiments Capital’s assets and a High Court order for Trillian to pay back almost R600 million to Eskom. Facing criminal charges and bankruptcy, unemployed and deemed a political risk, Mothepu experienced first-hand the loneliness of whistleblowing. The effect on her mental and physical health was devastating. Now, in Uncaptured, she recounts this troubling yet seminal chapter in her life with honesty, humility and wry humour in the hope that others who find themselves in a similar situation will follow in her footsteps and speak truth to power.

Written in the six weeks following the sudden death of Mat, Ferguson’s soul mate, Swift is a memoir that unfolds, breath by breath, as the narrator moves through shock, fury, unspeakable sorrow, and an almost mythic sense of responsibility to save the life of a Swift, which she rescued seven days before her beloved left Earth.

She somehow keeps the half-dead Swift alive through the blur of grief, but she has no real clue what she’s doing. Mat was the one who knew all about birds. He was the man with the heart of feathers who identified the rescue bird as a Little Swift when she brought it home. Mat told her many things about the bird: that it never touches the ground, that it eats, sleeps, drinks, and mates on the wing, and that it is a bird that can fly for up to two years without landing.

In the aftermath of his shocking departure, and all its absurd bureaucratic requirements, an unlikely long-distance Swift guide appears in Ferguson’s DMs on old Twitter. Her name is Hannah, a hardcore Swift activist from the UK. Ferguson is mesmerized by the Swift Queen’s ethereal beauty and the tattoos of Swifts across her back.

This rich and absorbing biography of Can Themba, iconic Drum-era journalist and writer, is the definitive history of a larger-than-life man who died too young. Siphiwo Mahala’s intensive and often fresh research features unprecedented archival access and interviews with Themba’s surviving colleagues and family.

Mahala’s biography takes a critical historical approach to Themba’s life and writing, giving a picture of the whole man, from his early beginnings in Marabastad to his sombre end in exile in Swaziland. The better-known elements of his life – his political views, passion for teaching and mentoring, and family life – are woven together with an examination of his literary influences and the impact of his own writing (especially his famous short story ‘The Suit’) on modern African writers in turn. Mahala, a master storyteller, deftly follows the threads of Themba’s dynamic life, showcasing his intellectual acumen, scholarly aptitude and wit, along with his flaws, contradictions and heartbreaks, against a backdrop of the sparkle and pathos of Sophiatown of the 1950s.

Can Themba’s successes and failures as well as his triumphs and tribulations reverberate on the pages of this long-awaited biography. The result is an authoritative and entertaining account of an often misunderstood figure in South Africa’s literary canon.