With the flair for narrative and the meticulous research that readers have come to expect, in The Diamond Queen Andrew Marr turns his attention to the monarch, chronicling the Queen’s pivotal role at the centre of the state, which is largely hidden from the public gaze, and making a strong case for the institution itself.

Arranged thematically, rather than chronologically, Marr dissects the Queen’s political relationships, crucially those with her Prime Ministers; he examines her role as Head of the Commonwealth, and her deep commitment to that Commonwealth of nations; he looks at the drastic changes in the media since her accession in 1952 and how the monarchy has had to change and adapt as a result. Under her watchful eye, it has been thoroughly modernized but what does the future hold for the House of Windsor?

This edition, fully revised and updated, features a new introduction and a new chapter that sets out to answer that crucial question. In it, Marr covers the Queen’s reign from the Diamond Jubilee to the run-up to the Platinum Jubilee in 2022, taking in the death of the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Charles’s plans for the future of the monarchy and examines what Elizabeth II’s lasting legacy might be.

It was in 1972 when the seemingly ordinary Craig Williamson registered at Wits University and joined the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS). Williamson was elected NUSAS’s vice president and in January 1977, when his career in student politics came to an abrupt end, he fled the country and from Europe continued his anti-apartheid ‘work’. But Williamson was not the activist his friends and comrades thought he was. In January 1980, Captain Williamson was unmasked as a South African spy.

Williamson returned to South Africa and during the turbulent 1980s worked for the foreign section of the South African Police’s notorious Security Branch and South Africa’s ‘super-spy’ transformed into a parcel-bomb assassin.

Through a series of interviews with the many people Williamson interacted with while he was undercover and after his secret identity was eventually exposed, Jonathan Ancer details Williamson’s double life, the stories of a generation of courageous activists, and the book eventually culminates with Ancer interviewing South Africa’s ‘super-spy’ face-to-face. It deals with crucial issues of justice, reconciliation, forgiveness, betrayal and the consequences of apartheid that South Africans are still grappling with.

John Kane-Berman is uniquely qualified to look back over the enormous political and social changes that have taken place in his lifetime in this fractious country. In his career as student leader, Rhodes Scholar, newspaperman, independent columnist, speech maker, commentator, and Chief Executive, for thirty years, of the South African Institute of Race Relations, Kane-Berman has been at the coal face of political change in South Africa.

The breadth and depth of ideas and events covered here are striking: the disintegration of apartheid, the chaos of the ‘people’s war’ and its contribution to the broader societal breakdown we see today, the liberal slide-away, the authoritarian ANC with its racial ideology and revolutionary goals, to mention only a few. Kane-Berman’s willingness to confront received wisdom is thoroughly refreshing, and he is forthright about the threats to freedom, democracy, and growth in contemporary South Africa, many of which he identified even before the ANC came to power.

Writing, debate, and reasoned argument have been Kane-Berman’s stock in trade and his clarity of vision and personal insight have created a memoir of rare candour and absorbing interest.

Take one over-the-top, bolshie, city-slicker Indian woman. One reticent and reserved white husband. And their three children. Add them all to a far-flung village in the South African countryside where mixed-race families are somewhat of a rarity, and you get front-row seats to a lifestyle that is both delightful and, at times, decidedly discombobulating.

Told with huge dollops of that quirky, sometimes perplexing Indian lingo that is unique to South Africans of Indian origin, garnished with hilarity and introspection, The Village Indian is a journey of the self and an authentic celebration of identity, culture and food, and that confusing, chaotic thing it is to sometimes be South African. From run-ins with deadly snakes, to raising chickens, to sprinklings of small-town skullduggery, scores settling, attempted coup d’états and scamming other villagers – you will get all the tea to titillate.

And in a small town, far, far away – meshugas aside – there is the magic of humanity and community.

The Village Indian is a tale for all South Africans.

An astonishing 94.6% of businesses fail to sell, closing at an enormous cost to the owner, their family, their staff and the economy. It’s a shocking realisation to many business owners that after all the courage it took to start, the creativity and care it took to build, every business faces only two possible ends: a sale or closure. So you’ve got to build to $ell.

Sweat, Scale, $ell shares real business-building stories about how ordinary business owners changed their fate using the Asset of Value™ method, a practical approach to building a winning business. With Pavlo Phitidis, they Sweated to reshape their business to be relevant to a changing world; they built a solid foundation for Scale; and then they pressed hard on the accelerator to ramp up growth in preparation for $ale to create a business any buyer would want.

Phitidis draws on 25 years of direct experience in conceptualising and building businesses across four continents. He has developed and brought to market business assets in excess of US$300 million through a combination of business start-ups, turnarounds, sales and acquisitions. Phitidis started, built and sold 12 businesses in nine years and took the lessons from the two failures, two IPOs and eight sales to build a business that builds businesses. As a co-founder of Aurik he has worked with over 1 500 established businesses across most sectors in the economy, including family businesses, partnerships and lone business owners.

PAVLO PHITIDIS is the resident entrepreneurial and business growth content contributor for Radio 702 and CapeTalk, the presenter and host of The Growth Engines for Business Day TV, as well as a speaker at both local and international business conferences.

Son of a Preacher Man is a story about a loving but fraught relationship between a father and son in apartheid South Africa.

The father was Bruce Evans, a Jewish-born, evangelical Anglican clergyman who became Bishop of Port Elizabeth. His children grew up in the 1960s and ’70s in a world awash with chapter-and-verse ‘born-again’ Christianity that included ‘talking-in-tongues’, ‘divine healings’ and exorcism.

Gavin, his middle son, who narrates the tale, eventually broke with the religious beliefs he’d inherited and threw himself into the ‘struggle’ for democracy while keeping his father at arms’ length. But they reconciled shortly before Bruce’s death from motor neuron disease in 1993.

The book delves into the psyches of both men and examines how it played out in the 33 years they had together.

At just 17, Fatima Meer threw herself into resisting racism, her first public act of defiance in a long and pioneering political life. Despite assassination attempts, she persevered on the courageous path she had chosen.

In this intimate memoir, Fatima Meer shares her story of growing up and of love, joy, longing and loss. As Meer open-heartedly reflects on her regrets as well as her triumphs, an enchanting tale emerges of a rebellious, revolutionary woman who never shied away from the truth.

Redi Tlhabi, warm-hearted, charismatic and loved throughout South Africa is as well known for her 702 and Cape Talk radio show as she is for her TV performances and Sunday Times newspaper column. In this astonishing debut, Endings & Beginnings, she makes the painful journey back to her death-marred childhood, a journey in which she eventually finds peace and allows her demons to rest.

Redi grew up in the '80s in Orlando, Soweto, with thoughts and emotions so intense they nearly swallowed up her childhood. It was a time when Soweto was under siege from two forces - apartheid and endemic, normalized crime. It was not strange or unusual to refer to so-and-so as `the rapist' or so-and-so as `the killer'. It was also at this time that her father - her hero - was violently murdered, his body discovered on the street, with one eye removed. The perpetrators were never found, and the neighbourhood continued to talk about how he had to be buried without his eye. And then Redi meets Mabegzo: handsome, charming and smooth; Mabegzo, rumoured gangster, murderer and rapist, a veritable `jack-roller' of the neighbourhood. Against her family's wishes she develops a strong and sometimes uncomfortable attraction to him. Redi herself doesn't understand why she is drawn to Mabegzo and why, at eleven, she feels the way that she does for this man known to many as a menace. Then he too is found lying dead in a pool of blood, two years after the death of her father. Redi has to remind herself to stay sane.

Endings & Beginnings is Redi's quest to find out the truth about the circumstances surrounding her father's death. As an adult she visits his grave and decides to find the people that killed her father and ask them why. She also goes on a quest to finally humanise Mabegzo who was hated and abhorred by so many when he was alive. She visits and speaks to his family, friends and neighbours and pieces together the life of this man who came fleetingly through her life but whose presence she would feel for a long time to come

Rhodes and his Banker tells the story of the remarkable friendship between Cecil John Rhodes, a larger-than-life historical figure, and Sir Lewis Michell, a modest, unassuming banker. The financial institution that brought the two together  – the Standard Bank – was at the heart of South Africa's transformation from agricultural backwater to industrial powerhouse in the late 19th century, thanks to the discovery first of diamonds and then of gold.

Richard Steyn, the author of acclaimed biographies of Jan Smuts, Louis Botha and Alfred Milner, intertwines the stories of Rhodes and Michell, chronicling the growth of the Standard Bank under Michell's careful stewardship and the seemingly irresistible rise of Rhodes, rapacious entrepreneur and empire-builder. He situates Rhodes and Michell at the high noon of the British Empire, a time when the benefits of British rule seemed self-evident to its ruling elite.

Michell became Rhodes's trusted confidant and published the first posthumous biography of 'the Colossus'. The banker's position gave him a unique insight into the character and motives of this most controversial and self-driven of British imperialists. Michell also did everything he could to fulfil Rhodes's ambition for a united South Africa and played a key role in setting up the Rhodes Scholarships, perhaps the most enduring legacy of Rhodes's career.

First published to international acclaim in 1996, The Seed Is Mine is a bold and innovative social history concerning the disenfranchised blacks who did so much to shape the destiny of South Africa.

After years of interviews with Kas Maine and his neighbours, employers, friends, and family – a rare triumph of collaborative courage and dedication – Charles van Onselen has recreated the entire life of a man who struggled to maintain his family in a world dedicated to enriching whites and impoverishing blacks, while South Africa was tearing them apart.

Francois van Coke span met die skryf van hierdie biografie saam met Annie Klopper om in sy eie stem die gebeure te vertel wat hom as mens en musikant gevorm het. Sy perspektief word gebied op als van Fokofpolisiekar tot Van Coke Kartel, die sukses van “Toe vind ek jou” en sy rol as afrigter op The Voice. Minder bekende en onbekende verhale word ook vertel oor wilde partytjies, vuisgevegte, dwelms, nagte in tronkselle, liefde, soberheid en pa-wees. Dít is sy stories, hoe hý dit onthou.

Rassie Erasmus is al geniaal genoem. Hy is al roekeloos genoem. Nog sy lewe lank het hy dinge anders gedoen. Nou sal Rassie op sy kenmerkende openhartige manier gesels oor sy lewe vol voorspoed en teëspoed, op en weg van die rugbyveld – as Springbokspeler, provinsiale afrigter, en as die hoofafrigter wat die nasionale span na die Rugbywêreldbeker-sege in 2019 en ook in die aanloop tot 2023 se Wêreldbeker gelei het.

Hy sal terugkyk op sy loopbaan as speler en afrigter, iemand wie se ingebore rugby-instink, vermoë om ’n wedstryd anders te lees en aptyt vir harde werk hom nog altyd onderskei het, en gelei het tot omstredenheid en mislukking, maar ook dawerende sukses.

Rassie werk saam met die bekende joernalis David O’Sullivan om sy lewensverhaal te vertel. David is ’n bekroonde skrywer en omroeper.

Chris Hani’s assassination in 1993 gave rise to one of South Africa’s greatest political questions: if he had survived, what impact would he have had on the ANC government?

On the 30th anniversary of his murder by right-wing fanatics, this updated version of the best-selling Hani: A Life Too Short re-evaluates his legacy and traces his life from his childhood in rural Transkei to the crisis in the ANC camps in Angola in the 1980s and the heady dawn of South Africa’s freedom.

Drawing on interviews and the recollections of those who knew him, this vividly written book provides a detailed account of the life of a hero of South Africa’s liberation, a communist party leader and Umkhonto we Sizwe chief of staff who was both an intellectual and a fighter.

For 250 years the Bryan Rostron’s family spread across the globe, helping to expand the British Empire and paint the map red. This is a personal reckoning with that dubious legacy, echoing down to the present in South Africa.

It begins with the ‘discovery’ of Tahiti in 1767 by an ancestor, from whose log book Rostron reveals that his sailors were exchanging the ship’s nails for sex with Tahitian maidens so that HMS Dolphin began, literally, to fall apart.

After the Anglo-Boer war, having emigrated to South Africa, one grandfather became editor of the Sunday Times, voicing racist opinions, and later of the Rand Daily Mail, at that time a voice of the Randlords. Ironically, his other grandfather worked for the Communist Party and printed revolutionary pamphlets for the violent 1922 Rand Revolt. In a bizarre twist, Rostron’s father managed the 1936 South African boxing team at the Berlin Olympics, where from under his nose their star boxer was recruited by the Nazis.

Uncovering family secrets and mistaken myths, Rostron offers a unique insight into modern-day South Africa’s colonial past.

This is more than a book. This is a blazing voyage.

Growing up in apartheid-era Chatsworth, Kumi Naidoo tells how his mother’s suicide when he was just 15 years old acted as a catalyst for his journey into radical action against the apartheid regime. In this revelatory and intimate story, Kumi describes his political awakening, and his experiences as a young community organiser and underground ANC activist during the 1980s.

His grief and anger became fuel for his efforts to help liberate South Africa and to build a better world.

Courageous, yet contested, Bulelani Ngcuka has always stood up for what he believes in. His decision in 2003 as National Director of Public Prosecutions not to prosecute then deputy president, Jacob Zuma, is a decision he still stands by to this day.

In this sweeping biography, based on many hours of interviews with Ngcuka, author Marion Sparg uncovers the roots of his fearless activism and tells his side of the story. She goes back in time to his modest beginnings in the Eastern Cape, to his lawyering years with the formidable Griffiths Mxenge, his various periods of detention, exile, and his homecoming.

Ngcuka played a critical role in establishing the National Prosecuting Authority, the elite crime-busting unit the Scorpions, and other mechanisms to tackle the country’s crime and corruption problems. Soon he faced one of his most difficult tasks – confronting former comrades who had become involved in illegal activities.

The Sting in the Tale is a first-hand account of our most recent legal and political history. It is also an intriguing story about political manoeuvrings, bombings and hijackings, urban-terror and “whispering” campaigns, lies, murder, alleged spies, intrigue, family, and love.

A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making - from the president who inspired us to believe in the power of democracy.

In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency - a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil. Obama takes readers on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4, 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation’s highest office. Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of U.S. partisan politics and international diplomacy.

Obama brings readers inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room, and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout, and authorizes Operation Neptune’s Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.

A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective - the story of one man’s bet with history, the faith of a community organizer tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of “hope and change,” and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters, and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible.

This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama’s conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.

‘Highly readable and packed with fascinating historical detail, this is the compelling story of a ripsnorting South African cricketer whose career was smothered by the shameless colour prejudice of Cecil John Rhodes and his snobbish cronies. By turns formidable, sad, enlivening and enormously informative, this book pays Hendricks the honour that has long been his due.’  – Bill Nasson
 
William Henry ‘Krom’ Hendricks was the first sportsman to be formally barred from representing South Africa on the basis of race. Hailing from Cape Town’s Bo-Kaap, he played in 1892 for the South African Malay team against the touring English, who insisted that he was among the best fast bowlers in the world. This made his exclusion from South Africa’s tour of England in 1894 all the more unjust.
 
Ranged against Hendricks were virulent racism and a political alliance between arch-imperialist Cecil John Rhodes, Afrikaner Bond leader J.H. Hofmeyr, and William Milton, who controlled cricket at the Cape through the Western Province Cricket Union.  Too Black to Wear Whites  documents Hendricks’s tireless struggle for recognition and the public controversies around his exclusion. The book shows how Hendricks was further sidelined as club teams made up of different races were prevented from playing against one another, saving white players the embarrassment of being shown up by the country’s best fast bowler.
 
Considering his importance in South African sports history, surprisingly little is known about Krom Hendricks. The story of his life is told here for the first time in a fascinating drama that describes the formation of a segregated South Africa through the career of an exceptional cricketer who dared to test the boundaries of the system.

In 1957 emigreer die negejarige Henk van Woerden vanaf Nederland met sy gesin na Kaapstad – leertas in die hand, mussie oor die ore, serp om die nek, glasoog in die oogkas. Eers veertig jaar later ontdek hy wat die rede was vir hierdie vertrek na Suid-Afrika: Sy pa was ’n kollaborateur in die Tweede Wêreldoorlog. Die emigrasie is die begin van ’n lewe as buitestaander en vorm later die goue draad in sy skilderye en literêre werk.

Koning Eenoog is ’n boeiende biografie van die ewig soekende emigrant Henk van Woerden (1947–2005), ’n skrywer wat nie net ’n bekroonde oeuvre agtergelaat het nie (Een mond vol glas – Alan Paton Award en die Frans Kellendonk-prys, Ultramarijn – Gouden Uil en Inktaap) maar ook die Nederlandse literatuur oor Suid-Afrika verander het.

For a man who loves the order and structure of institutions, Shaun ‘Fush’ Fuchs is hard to pigeonhole. A school rugby star, a soldier, a provincial powerlifter, a renowned waterpolo coach, a lifelong entrepreneur, a dynamic teacher, and a beloved headmaster.

In his memoir, Fush, Shaun tells the story of a life dedicated to changing the lives of others. From his school days at Jeppe High School for Boys and his activism heading up the SRC of the South African Student Teachers Union, to his time as an army infantry officer and his memorable teaching career, Shaun has always had an irrepressible instinct to succeed and to lead no matter what happens and no matter what the challenges. Because he has had to leap hurdles and overcome adversity almost every step of the way, Shaun has sought to leave the institutions he has been a part of as better, more diverse, more inclusive environments, where children feel safe and everyone has a space to be themselves.

Covering love and loss, pageants and coups, false accusations of terrorism, and the love of hundreds of students who have passed through schools Shaun has been part of, Fush will make you laugh, cry and reconsider what it truly means to educate and lead by example.

Predictability isn’t a word you will find in any Bushveld dictionary, and the life of wildlife guardian Mario Cesare has been anything but. After years as warden of Olifants River Game Reserve, his feet are firmly planted in this magnificent slice of Big Five country to the west of the Kruger Park, where he has experienced a rich life packed full of incidents far from routine.

In Heart Of A Game Ranger, Cesare recounts some of these hair-raising, heart-breaking and heart-warming moments: a buffalo calf reunited with its pining mother, injured lions given second chances and rhinos lost, one by one, to poaching. Nestled among these tales, Cesare pays homage to the brave, dedicated and curious personalities engaged in a deadly combat on the most majestic of battlefields. Yet, while rhino poaching is by far the reserve’s biggest problem, Cesare reveals how the daily struggles of a game ranger are so much broader – and the rewards, when they come, immense.

Heart Of A Game Ranger is a story of extremes, one of fierce loyalty and devastating betrayal where spectacular days that end in exhausted satisfaction and achievement are balanced by those that leave behind only despair and frustration. Seen through his eyes and spoken from the heart, Cesare tells a deeply personal story – not only of a life lived wild, but of the joy of Africa’s incredible natural world.

Following his explosive international bestseller Red Notice, Bill Browder returns with another gripping thriller chronicling how he became Vladimir Putin’s number one enemy by exposing Putin’s campaign to steal and launder hundreds of billions of dollars and kill anyone who stands in his way.

When Bill Browder’s young Russian lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, was beaten to death in a Moscow jail, Browder made it his life’s mission to go after his killers and make sure they faced justice. The first step of that mission was to uncover who was behind the $230 million tax refund scheme that Magnitsky was killed over. As Browder and his team tracked the money as it flowed out of Russia through the Baltics and Cyprus and on to Western Europe and the Americas, they were shocked to discover that Vladimir Putin himself was a beneficiary of the crime.

As law enforcement agencies began freezing the money, Putin retaliated. He and his cronies set up honey traps, hired process servers to chase Browder through cities, murdered more of his Russian allies, and enlisted some of the top lawyers and politicians in America to bring him down. Putin will stop at nothing to protect his money. As Freezing Order reveals, it was Browder’s campaign to expose Putin’s corruption that prompted Russia’s intervention in the 2016 US presidential election.

At once a financial caper, an international adventure, and a passionate plea for justice, Freezing Order is a stirring morality tale about how one man can take on one of the most ruthless villains in the world—and win.

An intimate, powerful, and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States

In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America - the first African-American to serve in that role - she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke, and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare.

In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her - from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world's most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it - in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations - and whose story inspires us to do the same.

Skollie, saint, scholar, hippest of hippies, imperfect musician with a perfect imagination, Syd Kitchen was, like all great artists, born to enrich his art and not himself.

Plagued by drugs, alcohol and depression, too much of an outlaw to be embraced by record companies, he frequently sold his furniture to cover production costs of his albums, seduced fans at concerts and music festivals worldwide with his dazzling ‘Afro-Saxon’ mix of folk, jazz, blues and rock interspersed with marvellously irreverent banter, and finally became the subject of several compelling documentaries, one of which - Fool in a Bubble - premiered in New York in 2010.

I have met many people who have gone through life with dreams of achieving success, but they never did. Some of them gave up hope because of a bad life experience or perhaps a lack of resilience made them abandon their unfulfilled dreams. I have spoken to thousands of people from disadvantaged backgrounds, people who have been through the worst life experiences, and they want to know “How does one overcome adversity and achieve success?”

My aims with this book are to provide answers to this question and to provide helpful tools and tips that can be utilised to achieve success in the face of adversity. In the first 9 chapters I tell my life story and give you a glimpse of the difficult journey I have travelled to achieve success. From chapter 10, I delve deeper into the ways in which I conducted my life in order to achieve success and I often use scriptures from the Bible to bring across certain concepts.

My prayer is if you are experiencing adversity that my life story will encourage you to persevere against all odds. With my journey, I demonstrate that for you to reach your destiny, you must cherish both the good and bad experiences. What you are experiencing now may be because of poor choices or circumstances beyond your control, but these experiences will mould you into the person that God has predestined you to become, and they will guide you to your destiny.