‘I share to normalise talking about those shameful, hurtful things we keep hidden. I share because shame loses its power when we find safe spaces to share our truth … and when women heal, generations heal.’

To her thousands of fans, Wisdom & Wellness founder, speaker and influencer Mpoomy Ledwaba is a symbol of strength and women empowerment. But going from university dropout to Forbes magazine’s list of 30 Under 30 wasn’t always easy – it took a lot of courage and a commitment to personal growth.

How Did We Get Here? is her coming-of-age story. Looking back on her upbringing, major milestones and the challenges she’s faced, Mpoomy takes us on her journey of self-discovery. Behind the Instagram likes and thousands of YouTube subscribers is a bright girl who sometimes bit off more than she could chew. This mother of two, who is married to an award-winning musician, didn’t always have a plan and rarely fitted the mould of ‘the good wife’.

In this frank account, Mpoomy writes openly about the hurt she’s experienced, the mistakes she’s made and some of the hard truths she’s had to learn about life, but also about how her faith has been a guiding light. As a firm believer in the power of stories, she uses her personal history to show how to live a purposeful life on all levels.

Portchie is een van Suid-Afrika se suksesvolste kunstenaars, maar wie is die man wat agter die skilderye skuil? Waar kom die naam Portchie vandaan? En hoe en wanneer het Jan Hendrik Viljoen van die klein dorpie Tweeling in die Vrystaat, aangemeld om die wêreldbekende kunstenaar Portchie te word? Hierdie memoir kombineer Portchie se inspirerende verhaal met foto’s, staaltjies en selfs resepte. Dit vertel die storie agter die storie: onopgesmuk, sonder tierlantjies, maar met ’n tikkie flair.

The Soul of a Lion, an engaging memoir by Willie Labuschagne, is an exhilarating journey which begins with the young conservationist’s unique experiences with wild animals. From his groundbreaking research on the desert cheetah’s behaviour and ecology to becoming an internationally respected consultant on environmental and wildlife-related issues, he holds the reader’s attention with all the skill of the master storyteller.

The numerous occasions when Willie faced potentially life-threatening situations with wild animals are vividly recounted, many of them wryly humorous while others evoke deep emotion. But not all animal encounters took place in the wild. A significant and poignant encounter that further inspired Willie’s approach to conservation occurred when, during his time as director of the Johannesburg Zoo, he and his family hand-raised a newborn lion cub that had been rejected by its mother. He recalls the countless obstacles put in his way by the bureaucratic nature of his own species during his tenure at the zoo. But despite numerous challenges he persisted in his goal of transforming and improving zoological institutions.

A moving force behind the changing nature of professionally managed zoological gardens, his book reminds us that, while many of the world’s zoos should be unconditionally closed, progressive modern zoos are becoming increasingly aligned to wildlife conservation: they are vital for ensuring the survival of threatened species.

Willie shares his entertaining and often moving life experiences with warmth and understanding, whether it is sleeping under the stars with the bushmen of the Kgalagadi desert or observing the traditions of the Zulu Royal House. His travels in the African landscape in particular are an exciting panorama of many distinctive habitats, from the relentless desert of the Skeleton Coast in Namibia to the pristine beauty of the Tsitsikamma Forest and the breathtaking vastness of the African bushveld.

Importantly, he is forthright in his view of the critical position of the world we live in and the future it holds for mankind and believes that we are all part of a custodianship which should do everything in its power to protect our fragile environment.

Herman Mashaba rose from humble beginnings to become one of South Africa’s wealthiest and best-known entrepreneurs, as well as Mayor of Johannesburg.

His remarkable story begins in a small village in Gauteng, where we meet the cocky youngster who refused to settle for a future that offered nothing. Forced to drop out of university, the determined young man fought to establish the first black-owned haircare company in South Africa. Mashaba struggled every day of his life – against apartheid, with its demeaning laws, and against his competitors to grab market share for his business. In the process, Mashaba learnt lessons that few business schools teach today.

This is a story of survival, and of determination in adversity. It is also a love story between Herman and Connie, his wife of 35 years, who embarked on this journey together. Mashaba shows the importance of having a vision, daring to dream it, and then making it happen. This inspiring book will leave you with the question: “If he did it, why can’t I?”

Influencers dominate social media. This book is not only a  personal journey filled with overcoming challenges, but also inspires anyone to go after their dreams, whether it's an entrepreneurial adventure or just to curate a lifestyle that excites you every morning.

A story that weaves biography and business tips through a journey from humble beginnings in Soweto and eventually finds Kefilwe visiting the fashion capital of the world, Milan!

Anger, hurt, loss, rejection … these feelings are familiar to the families who, in the early 1970s, were forced from their homes in Harfield Village in Cape Town’s southern suburbs. Siona O’Connell brings their stories to light. She examines the lost ways of life, the sense of home and belonging.

David Brown’s images show what life was like in Harfield before the removals, and his images are echoed by recent photos of the same former residents.

It is well known that the African National Congress was formed in 1912 and is considered the oldest political organisation on the African continent. What is often not widely known is that the person who founded it was one Pixley ka Isaka Seme, a thirty-year-old black South African from Inanda outside the city of Durban.

What is remarkable about Seme’s achievement in founding the ANC is not only that he succeeded where most had failed at forging black political unity. It is also the speed at which he did it. He had just returned to South Africa from the United Kingdom and the United States of America, where he had been a student since he was a teenager. In slightly over a year the founding conference of the ANC was convened and he was at its helm as the main organiser.

Seme also established a national newspaper, became one of the pioneering black lawyers in South Africa, bought land from white farmers for black settlement right at the time when opposition to it was gaining momentum, became a sought-after adviser and confidant to African royalty, and was considered a leading visionary for black economic empowerment. And yet, when he became president general of the ANC in the 1930s, he brought it to its knees through sheer ineptitude and an authoritarian style of leadership. On more than one occasion he was found guilty for breaching the law, which partly led to him being struck off the roll of attorneys.

This book discusses in detail Seme’s extraordinary life, from his humble beginnings at Inanda Mission to his triumphs and disappointments across the continents, in his public and private life. When Seme died in 1951 he was bankrupt and his political standing had suffered greatly. And yet he was praised as one of the greatest South Africans ever to have lived. For all this, he has largely been forgotten. This biography brings the remarkable life of this extraordinary South African back to public consciousness.

Tales of Two Countries is Ray Dearlove’s third book. He takes the reader through his childhood in apartheid-era South Africa and the turbulent years before Nelson Mandela assumed the presidency in 1994.

Living in Australia for more than thirty years brought its own share of interesting people, events and opportunities. There are many stories about the raw challenges of moving countries. It has some very moving and some very humorous moments, all told in Ray’s discerning and direct style.

Forewords by Tony Park, Jean-Claude van Damme and Andrian Gardner.

Thando Manana was the third black African player to don a Springbok jersey after unification in 1992, when he made his debut in 2000 in a tour game against Argentina A.

His route to the top of the game was unpredictable and unusual. From his humble beginnings in the township of New Brighton, Port Elizabeth, Thando grew to become one of the grittiest loose-forwards of South African rugby, despite only starting the game at the age of 16. His rise through rugby ranks, while earning a reputation as a tough-tackling lock and later openside flanker, was astonishingly rapid, especially for a player of colour at the time. Within two years of picking up a rugby ball, he represented Eastern Province at Craven Week, and by 2000 he was a Springbok. But it isn’t solely Thando’s rugby journey that makes Being A Black Springbok a remarkable sports biography. It’s learning how he has negotiated life’s perils and pitfalls, which threatened to derail both his sporting ambitions and the course of his life.

He had to negotiate an unlikely, but fateful, kinship with a known Port Elizabeth drug-lord, who took Thando under his wing when he was a young, gullible up-and-comer at Spring Rose. Rejected by his father early in his life, Thando had to deal with a sense of abandonment and a missing protective figure and find, along the way, people to lean on.

Thando tells his story with the refreshing candour he has become synonymous with as a rugby commentator, pundit and member of the infamous Room Dividers team on Metro FM. He has arguably become rugby’s strongest advocate for the advancement of black people’s interests in the sport, and his personal journey reveals why.

It is September 1987. The Angolan Army – with the support of Cuban troops and Soviet advisors – has built up a massive force on the Lomba River near Cuito Cuanavale in southern Angola. Their goal? To capture Jamba, the headquarters of the rebel group Unita, supported by the South African Defence Force (SADF) in the so-called Border War.

In the battles that followed, and shortly thereafter centred around the small town of Cuito Cuanavale, 3 000 SADF soldiers and 8 000 Unita fighters were up against a much bigger Angolan and Cuban force of over 50 000 men.

Thousands of soldiers died in the vicious fighting that is described in vivid detail in this book. Bridgland pieced together this account through scores of interviews with SADF men who were on the front line. This dramatic retelling takes the reader to the heart of the action.

Sol Kerzner, the controversial and charismatic business tycoon, once dominated the Southern African tourism landscape. He left an indelible mark by developing dream destinations like Sun City, The Palace, and the Atlantis developments in the Bahamas and Dubai.

In this riveting memoir, Venison – Sol’s longtime associate, confidante, and eventual adversary – offers an intimate, behind-the-scenes look at the life of Kerzner whose legacy has long been shrouded in mystery, with no comprehensive biography until now. Venison fills in the gaps with vivid personal anecdotes and exclusive details, including the little-known relationship between Kerzner and Mandela, which played a crucial role in South Africa’s political transition in the early 1990s.

This tour de force unveils the true Kerzner – the brilliant, magnetic, chain-smoking, whiskey-drinking workaholic – who transcended borders and became a key player in the international hospitality industry and South Africa’s own Sun King.

The discovery of the modern-day coelacanth will forever be linked with the name of JLB Smith. An intense, irascible, eccentric man, JLB (as he was widely known) and his long-suffering wife Margaret were both remarkable South African scientists who changed the course of the biological sciences.

Best known for their research on the coelacanth, they also contributed in many other ways to the scientific study of fishes (ichthyology) and related fields.

• The first comprehensive biography about JLB and Margaret Smith.
• Traces their formative years and serendipitous meeting, leading up to the discovery of the coelacanth, and the tumultuous years that followed.
• Details their punitive work ethic, eccentric and rugged lifestyle, and their astonishingly productive lives.
• A story awash with adventure, travel, discovery, risk-taking, near-death experiences – and their extraordinary contribution to science.

Illustrated with black-and-white images of the Smiths’ fascinating lives, as well as a 16-page colour section, Mike Bruton’s lively account fills a scientific and biographical niche and will become a classic of the South African scene.

Without much fanfare Ahmed Kathrada worked alongside Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and other giants in the struggle to end racial discrimination in South Africa. He faced house arrest and many court trials related to his activism until, finally, a trial for sabotage saw him sentenced to life imprisonment alongside Mandela and six others.

Conversations with a Gentle Soul has its origins in a series of discussions between Kathrada and Sahm Venter about his opinions, encounters and experiences. Throughout his life, Kathrada has refused to hang on to negative emotions such as hatred and bitterness. Instead, he radiates contentment and the openness of a man at peace with himself. His wisdom is packaged within layers of optimism, mischievousness and humour, and he provides insights that are of value to all South Africans.

When John Kgoana Nkadimeng travelled from Sekhukhuneland to the Witwatersrand in 1944, he was one of thousands of migrants seeking work in town. But his encounters with racial injustice and contact with activists drew him down a very different path, one which was dedicated to the struggle.

Mokgomana tells the story of Nkadimeng, from his origins in the rural village of Manganeng, in an area with a long history of resistance to colonial rule, through his growing involvement in trade unions, the Communist Party and the ANC. He spearheaded rural opposition to Bantu Authorities, helped take new MK recruits out of the country, and played a crucial role in re-establishing the ANC underground after the state smashed resistance networks. In 1976 he fled South Africa for the perilous terrain of building MK organisations in Swaziland and Mozambique. In 1982 he settled in Lusaka and played a pivotal part in the leadership of the ANC, Communist Party and SACTU during that decisive decade.

Mokgomana represents a new focus on an under-acknowledged leader and offers fresh perspectives on over four decades of struggle history. It is also the story of the family which supported him, enduring harassment and separation, and their own splintered trajectories through exile and homecoming.

Upon encountering Historian, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich’s quote “Well behaved women seldom make history” – Malebo knew that she was tired of everyone else but herself having a say on who and what she should be. Appropriating this quote, Malebo boldly renounces societal expectations placed on her as a Black woman and shares her journey towards misbehaviour. According to Malebo, it is a norm for a Black woman to live through a society that will prescribe what it means to be a well behaved woman. Acting like this prescribed woman equals good behaviour. But what happens when a black woman decides to live her own life and becomes her own form of who she wants to be? She is often seen as misbehaving.

Miss Behave challenges society’s deep-seated beliefs about what it means to be a well behaved woman. In this book, Malebo tracks her journey on a path towards achieving total autonomy and self-determinism. Miss Behave will challenge, rattle and occasionally cause you to reflect on your own life – asking yourself the question – are you truly living life the way you want to?

At once intimate and analytical, Mandla J. Radebe has written a powerful and information-packed biography of one of the signal leaders of the 16 June 1976 generation.

The Lost Prince of the ANC is the first comprehensive enquiry into Mzala’s story, tracing his life from birth to his untimely death in 1991, at the age of 35, just after his return to South Africa. Radebe’s richly researched biography, is the story too, of the radical tradition of the liberation movement, which flourished during its underground days.

This revelatory biography of a critical thinker who had much to offer the post-apartheid South Africa, does more than fill a gap in our history: its insights open a door for the reader to imagine politics and society anew.

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.

From beginnings on a gravel court on a farm in rural South Africa, Gordon Forbes went on to travel the world with his long-time tennis partner Abe Segal during the late 1950s and early 60s: the glory days of Fred Perry, Roy Emerson and Virginia Wade. In this delightful insider’s account of tennis on the international circuit, Forbes looks back with laughter at his tennis playing years through a varied, successful and often outrageous career on the world’s courts.

This newly published edition of A Handful Of Summers brings back a cult classic, revealing an era populated by the most colourful tennis players of all time. More about the hilarious escapades of players than the game itself, the book begins with a short series of vignettes from Forbes’s childhood on an Eastern Cape farm in South Africa, then takes the reader on a tennis tour – into locker rooms and restaurants, narrow streets and small hotels, and onwards to the lawns of Wimbledon and the caramel coloured clays of Roland Garros.

A player of international repute, Gordon Forbes has managed to capture the irresistible charm of an era while telling the story of a young man striving to follow signposts on the winding roads of life.

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.

When leaders of the ANC were raided and arrested in Rivonia, South Africa in July 1963, AnnMarie Wolpe knew that her husband Harold - member of the banned movement and lawyer to Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and others - would inevitably be imprisoned. Suddenly, alone with three children, one of them very ill, AnnMarie found herself at the heart of an intense political and social drama.

She smuggled a saw and files to Harold and helped him and three others in a dramatic prison escape. While Harold took flight to Dar-es-Salaam, via Swaziland, Botswana and Zaire, AnnMarie waited anxiously. Finally the news came Harold was safe. AnnMarie left for London, joined soon by Harold and later by the children. In London they made a new life for themselves until, after nearly thirty years in exile, they were able to return 'home' in 1991 with excitement and huge misgivings.

Telling for the first time the saga of the escape that made world headlines, and exploring the consequences of being the wife of a political figure, The Long Way Home is an extraordinary, gripping autobiography.

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

Alfred Qabula was a central figure in the cultural movement that emerged among working people in and around Durban in the 1980s. The movement was an innovative attempt to draw on the oral poetry developed among the Nguni people over many centuries. Qabula was a forklift driver in the Dunlop tyre factory in Durban at the time this book was developed. He used the art of telling stories to critique the exploitation of black workers and their oppression under apartheid.

A Working Life, Cruel Beyond Belief is the first book in the Hidden Voices series and is Qabula’s testament, telling the powerful story of his life and work. It also contains a generous selection of his poetry. The Hidden Voices Project emerged out of an interest in intellectual left contributions towards discussions on race, class, ethnicity and nationalism in South Africa. Specifically, the project seeks to examine and make available writings on left thought under apartheid. The aim is to look at hidden voices – voices outside of the university system or academic voices suppressed by apartheid pressures. Before and during the apartheid years, many universities were closed to existing local ideas and debates, and critical intellectual debates, ideas, texts, poetry and songs often originated outside academia during the period of the struggle for liberation.

Ná herhaaldelike polisiebrouwerk begin kaptein Ben Booysen die Krugersdorp-moorde in 2016 manalleen ondersoek.

Booysen haal koerantvoorblaaie toe hy die baasbrein, Cecilia Steyn, en haar vyf trawante vir minstens 11 moorde in hegtenis neem.

Suid-Afrika se eie “Chuck Norris” neem die leser tot agter die skerms van die satanistiese moorde en onthul nuwe, skokkende besonderhede van die misdade wat die land amper ’n dekade lank vasgenael gehou het.

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.

Melinda Ferguson is the bestselling author of her addiction trilogy: Smacked, Hooked and Crashed. She is also an award-winning publisher.

To escape the pandemic, Ferguson finds her dream house on a private nature reserve, secluded in the otherworldly Cedarberg. A week before it's registered, a beautiful high-powered exec is brutally murdered next door. How could heaven have transformed into hell in an instant?

Written in her no-holds-barred signature style, Bamboozled is set in an age of fear, on a dystopian planet floundering in a maze of deception. In her search for sanity, Ferguson tries to untangle herself from a masked world gone mad, in which the media are controlled by the Invisible, Big Tech are mining our lives, where truth-tellers are mercilessly hunted and where, in certain countries, there are now Ministries of Loneliness.

Driven by an ancient human yearning to connect, the author must go on a deep journey into the unknown if she is to find her garden of songbirds and her torch of freedom and joy. The book is also about losing money and finding magic, while trying to work out who killed the woman next door.