“This apricot tree has multiple souls that fill me with wonder every morning and enchant me by afternoon. This tree has bitter-sweet memories, just like the fruit it bears.”

If the apricot trees of Soweto could talk, what stories would they tell? This short story collection provides an imaginative answer. Imbued with a vivid sense of place, it captures the vibrancy of the township and surrounds. Told with satirical flair, life and death are intertwined in these tales where funerals and the ancestors feature strongly; where cemeteries are places to show off your new car and catch up on the latest gossip.

Populating these stories is a politician mesmerised by his mistress’s manicure, zama-zamas running businesses underground, a sangoma with a remedy for theft, soccer fans ready to mete out a bloody justice, a private dancer in love and many other intriguing characters.

Take your seat under the apricot tree and be enthralled by tales that are both entertaining and thought-provoking.

Wat skuil agter die Sheldon-fortuin?

Zabeth Meyer beland op Kronkelrivier om navorsing vir die krimiskrywer Wilbur Sheldon te doen. In sy skatryk familie se Victoriaanse herehuis, Sheldon Manor, kom sy al hul vreemde tragedies en intriges teë: Eers verdrink die oudste Sheldonkleinkind, en ’n paar jaar later sterf sewe Sheldons op een dag.

Net een erfgenaam van die Sheldon-fortuin bly oor: Die onbekwame Keith. En Ethel, die familiematriarg, is al in haar tagtigs.

Kort ná Zabeth se aankoms gebeur daar nog ’n ongeluk by Sheldon Manor en skielik lyk gebeure van vyf en twintig jaar gelede heel anders ...

Tussen Zabeth, Wilbur en die aantreklike Liam Sheldon moet hulle die dinastie se donker geheime en hul elkeen se eie verlede ontrafel voordat nog iemand seerkry.

Met die oorspronklike publikasie van die drie romans oor die wel en wee van vier geslagte Meissners het Ena Murray opnuut haar status as koningin van die Afrikaanse liefdesverhaal gestand gedoen. Die drieluik bestaan uit: Die Meissner-kliniek, waar ons die die stigter van die eksklusiewe privaat kliniek en sy gedugte span dokters ontmoet. Die vrede word in 'n oogwink omvergewerp wanneer 'n nuwe trolliejoggie daar begin werk ... Dokter Julene, waar Julene die veilige hawe van die Meissner-kliniek verlaat om by haar biologiese pa in Switserland aan te sluit ... en dan onverwags in Istanboel beland. En Die ongebore uur, waar Inge Buchner, die agterkleindogter van dr. Albert Meissner, alles in haar vermoe doen om te probeer verseker dat iemand met die van Meissner weer aan die hoof van die kliniek sal staan.

n Langverwagte versameling van Hennie Aucamp se beste kortverhale. Aucamp was by uitstek 'n kortverhaalskrywer, en is in 1982 met die Hertzogprys vir sy prosawerk bekroon. Hierdie versameling bevat sy eie keuse uit die vele kortverhale waarmee hy lesers oor die dekades heen geraak en vermaak het. Die keuse is so interessant soos die verhale self - daar is voorspelbare bekende verhale, en ook minder bekendes waarvoor hy 'n spesiale toegeneentheid gehad het. Saamgestel deur Johann de Lange.

Reghardt du Toit is ’n bekende sanger met die wêreld aan sy voete. ’n Ernstige ongeluk verander sy lewe onherroeplik. As gevolg van gehoorverlies, is sing skielik buite die kwessie. Hy gaan soek na ’n nuwe begin in die klein WesKaapse dorpie van Philadelphia.

Hier maak Reghardt ’n boetiekrestaurant oop terwyl die dorpie en inwoners in sy hart inkruip. ’n Dokter met ’n praktyk in die naburige Malmesbury trek ook met sy gesin en ’n geheimsinnige au pair na Philadelphia.

Die plaaslike dominee se dogter is ’n internasionale model en haar pa se enigste kind. Sy weet sy presies wat sy in die lewe wil hê. Sy spits haar toe daarop om Reghardt se hart te verower. Die dowe sanger fokus egter daarop om mentor te wees vir ’n seun wat sy eie sangtalent wil slyp.

’n Skokkende tragedie bring ’n onverwagse wenteling in almal se lewens. Sal Reghardt genoeg liefde en vergifnis kan vind om die ontrafeling wat volg te weerstaan, of sal alles weer inmekaartuimel?

Twenty-nine-year-old Zola has spent the past 15 years working and studying in Europe thanks to a series of high school bursaries and opportunities that allowed her to escape the hardships of South Africa.

But when her visa finally expires and there are no further prospects in sight, she has no choice but to leave behind her life, lover and the dreams she has begun to build in Germany and return home to an uncertain future.

The Thing With Zola is a humorous and sexy beach read about a young woman navigating the working world, family politics and an unexpected office romance, all while trying to figure out her place in a country that no longer feels like home. Basically, it's complicated.

‘Outside, in the road, behind what looks like some hastily erected barricades, I see a crowd.

Television cameras. Lights. Paparazzi. Press photographers.

They’ve materialised out of nowhere. What looks like over a hundred locals and tourists are peering into every car leaving this area. Crowding against the car doors, pushing cameras up against the windows. Jostling. Screaming. Shouting. In all my anxiety, hard- nosed journalist that I’m not, during the hours spent shifting around in the plastic seat in the waiting room I had somehow not understood the enormity of this story.’

As deputy editor of the glamorous FILLE magazine in London, Lisa Lassiter had almost passed up the chance of a weekend on a billionaire’s yacht off the coast of Mykonos. But her best friend Claudia Hemmingway, on her way to becoming one of the hottest movie stars on the planet, could be very persuasive when she wanted something. Not only would they get there by private jet, she’d told Lisa, they would also get to rub shoulders with VIP guests – not least a famous Hollywood film producer. It would be a weekend of fun, sunshine, champagne and partying. And it was all of those things. Until it wasn’t.

Lisa has spent ten years trying to get past that weekend. If she has learnt anything, it is that unfinished business and secrets always work their way to the surface. Moving on is one thing; forgetting is another, and forgiving ... well, where to start?

From the author of The Accident and Two Months comes the story of a whirlwind friendship and the dark secrets lurking beneath it.

After a tumultuous marriage, Mary Wilson is happy in her uncomplicated life, focusing on her twelve-year-old son. She has always been content with her little family – but then she finds an old postcard that throws her past into question ...

When an invitation arrives for her high school reunion, Mary jumps at the chance of a distraction from the shock discovery, and meeting her old classmate April feels like a gift. Despite barely remembering April, Mary throws herself into the new friendship and finds her previously quiet social life reinvigorated.

But as the bonds between them are forged, Mary finds herself drawn further and further into April’s life and marriage, increasingly fearing that everything is not as perfect as it seems. Is her own painful past clouding her judgement, or is Mary right to suspect that the people she trusts most are the ones with the most to hide?

Almal in Jurassic Park op die Kaapse Vlakte ken vir Anwaar ‘Ahnie’ Brandt vandat hy ’n ekstra in die film GangStar was. Maar die baas van die Butcher Boys soek nog meer roem. Nou maak die gang hulle eie movies met hul selfone – movies wat die vrees in mense se oë vasvang. Ahnie se ma, Mary, kyk anderpad en sê sy weet van niks. Sy het mos nog ’n baksteenfoon, sy like nie van tegnologie nie.

Nicole Lamb en Derick Delcarme is in matriek en verlief, maar toe Nicole swanger raak, moet Derick die skool verlaat om ’n werk te soek. Hy het geen ander keuse as om by die UML-gang aan te sluit nie, want daar kan hy darem geld maak.

Rolanda Fischer wil ’n lewe van weelde soos ’n Cape Kardashian hê en as sy nie ’n celebrity op sosiale media kan word nie, gaan sy vir haar ’n ryk man kry. Maar sy hou ook van ’n bad boy . . .

In Kinnes deur Chase Rhys word moeilike waarhede met deernis en humor oopgeskryf.

’n Vreemdeling by ’n familiebegrafnis keer Kristie se lewe onderstebo. Haar daaglikse take by die argiteksfirma beleef ook ’n wending: Erik is ’n moeilike kliёnt en ook die onweerstaanbare tipe. Toe Kristie se werklikheid ineenstort, vlug sy na Phuket in Thailand. Maar die eiland bring nie vir haar die gemoedsrus waarop sy gehoop het nie. Terwyl sy van haar omgekeerde wêreld probeer sin maak, begin een van die laaste bastions in haar lewe wankel.

Bessie Botha, deesdae weduwee Botha, woon saam met haar broer, Willem, op ’n kleinhoewe buite Bloemfontein. 1974 was tot dusver nie ’n goeie jaar nie, en om alles te kroon is oorlede Stefaans se welgestelde broer en sy jong neus-in-die-lug vrou op pad om te kom
kuier.

Bessie ontferm haar oor al wat kind en dier is in die gemeenskap. Sy meng ook graag by ander se sake in wanneer dit lyk asof Dominee of Gezina, die nuwe voorsitster van die sustersvereniging, nie hul kant bring nie.

Wanneer die veertienjarige Annatjie de Villiers weer een Sondag ná kerk langs die treinspoor staan en flikkers gooi vir al wat ’n treindrywer is, besluit Bessie om die meisiekind ’n boek in die hand te stop sodat sy kan léér waar babas vandaan kom.

Bessie se hangkasbiblioteek is propvol heimwee en humor, met uiteenlopende karakters net so kleurryk soos die boeke in Bessie se spaarkamerhangkas. Madelein Rust op haar beste!

In 2021, is Damian de Jong biesag mette boek oo serial killers. Hy force homself ommie dae te onthou toe hy asse kind innie 90s oppie sandduine gespeel. Die man wattie media ‘The Railway Ripper' noem, het begin coloured boys doodmaak en begrawe in vlak grafte innie bosse en sandduine rondomie Western Cape. Hy praat met ex-detective Michelle Wakefield ma soe meer sy die feite vi Damian ytlê, soe minner vestaan hy wat rêrag daityd gebeerit.

Twenty-six years is a long time not to be alive.

Since the accident that ruined her life, Catherine has lived on autopilot, going through the motions of work and motherhood without being fully present. Trying to fill the gap, her adult daughter, Julia, is looking for love in all the wrong places, and wreaking havoc on the lives that she touches along the way.

Just what will it take to shock Catherine back into life?

It is 2003 – ten years since Spud Milton’s class of 93 matriculated and the boys went their separate ways. Despite their seemingly unbreakable bond, the Crazy 8 – Rambo, Mad Dog, Vern, Fatty, Garth Garlic, Boggo, Simon and Spud – have not kept in touch. Or at least, not as far as Spud knows. When he receives an invitation from the school to attend the 10 Year Reunion weekend, Spud is determined to avoid the event at all costs, but he hasn’t reckoned with the bombardment of intrusive messages and threatening phone calls from his former dorm mates. No one is going to bend his arm, not this time; he is immune to peer pressure and wise to Rambo’s devious manipulation techniques. Spud has moved on. And, anyway, he has enough to worry about on the home front.

At 28 Spud is stuck in a one-third life crisis. Reflecting on a decade of spectacular non-achievement, at a point where he’s coming to realise that his glittering stage career might have stalled before it’s even begun, casts him into deep gloom. For the former scholarship kid, the prospect of once again having to measure up to his blue-blooded school friends – and be found wanting – has him riddled with anxiety. Not only that. Spud still doesn’t have a serious girlfriend, which has seen him resort to a questionable international bathsexting relationship with an old flame. Not to mention that circumstances have forced him to move back in with his parents and his senile grandmother, Wombat, whose walks never end where they began.

After a wildly unsuccessful fishing trip with his father, as well as a return to his old way of figuring things out – writing in his diary – to his own surprise, Spud finds his reunion resistance crumbling. Curiosity and courage win the day. It’s just a weekend, after all … what could possibly go wrong?

Soms lê ek in my bed, my lyf opgekrul om herinneringe aan hom, totdat dit voel asof die woonstel se dak oplig en die mure wegval en ek omhels word deur die nag se fluweelsagte duisternis. Dan dryf ek uit my lyf, tot in die buitenste ruim waar my ouers glo al vir dekades lank saam met ruimterommel en stukkies meteoriet, al om en om ’n hemelliggaam sweef.

Op my boekrak staan ’n geraamde foto van hulle, geneem net voor hul laaste ruimtesending. Hul gesigte is stroef, asof hulle geweet het dit is hul laaste missie.

Of dalk het hulle net in die son gekyk.

Mila Kozlowa is ’n Moskouse psigoterapeut wat tydens beradingsessies sit en fantaseer oor geroosterde salm en seks.

Sy dink ook aan haar kinderjare – sprokiesagtige besoeke aan ’n afgeleë hut in ’n berkewoud saam met haar ouma Babusja. Nou is Babusja oud en verswak en Mila is verantwoordelik vir haar. Wat steek haar ouma vir haar weg? Waar is Mila se ouers? Het hulle regtig tydens ’n ruimtereis verdwyn?

Intussen ontmoet Mila ’n Suid-Afrikaner wat sy oorlogtrauma met haar deel en kort voor lank begin die skeidslyn tussen werklikheid en fantasie vervaag. Waar eindig die droom en begin die realiteit? En vir hoe lank kan ’n mens jou eie leuens glo?

Drawing on the true history of ‘Farini’s Friendly Zulus’, a group of men who were taken to Britain and then to America as performing curiosities, the novel opens in 1885 in wintry New York City.

The protagonist, Mpiyezintombi, simply called Em-Pee by the English-speakers, loses more than his name in this far-off foreign country; he is seen as little more than a freak-show act – though he is not kept in a cage like the beautiful Dinka Princess, with her gold-painted papier-mâché crown and fur cape. For EmPee, it is love at first sight, but the caged woman is not free to love anyone back: she is the property of Monsieur Duval, proprietor of Duval Ethnological Expositions.

And so begins one of Zakes Mda’s most striking stories, one that depicts terrible historical injustices and indignities, while at the same time celebrating the vigour and ingenuity of the creative spirit, and the transformative power of love.

In an already-great pantheon of Mda love stories and classic gems, this may be his most powerful work yet.

'n Jong man op pad na 'n klooster in Frankryk word deur sy familie aangeraai om eers 'n verlangse oom in Parys op te soek. Adelbert van Breda was 'n senior priester in die Katolieke Kerk wat dekades gelede Parys toe getrek en hom tot die Katolisisme bekeer het.

Miskien sal oom Adelbert hom van raad en van wyse insig kan voorsien. Sy hartsbegeerte is om sy saai, voorstedelike lewe op te gee en iewers in die stilte 'n asketiese bestaan te kan voer.

Terwyl om Adelbert laat een aand tee in 'n stokou Russiese koperkoker brou, begin die afgetrede priester van sy eie pelgrimstogte vertel. 

'n Veelvlakkige, teer roman oor selfontdekking, geloof en vriendskap.

Bullish about peaking her psychologist career, she struts around in stilettos whilst leading a new way of thinking in business, with equal gravitas. Married happily, jet-setting the globe, she portrays an image of promise and success.

Believing that talent is enough, she sets about a path towards excellence, yet finds herself wedged in a layered coporate cult. She rebels unwittingly, believing that if she has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. Bitchiness permeates on an extreme scale, as the stakes are high with power, wealth and glamour.

Can Azra maintain her mental stamina or does she fall?

Showcasing African Gothic at its finest, this hypnotic novel tangles together classic texts of madness and female rebellion alongside elements of the jingoistic novels of Victorian adventurer H. Rider Haggard. The result is an extraordinary reinvention of colonial and patriarchal perspectives.

The unnamed narrator spins a web back through a century of colonial possession – political, spiritual and mental – to imagine the stories of conquest and captivity, control and disruption, from the perspective of the women and men ‘half-broken’ by the stigmas attached to race and mental illness. Equally ‘half-broken’ are those dehumanised by their insane greed for dominion and treasure.

With trademark compassion and complexity, Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu balances the humanity of her characters against the cruelty of empire, making for a spellbinding and literally haunting account of love and magic.

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.

Kolisile, ’n jong Xhosa uit die Transkei, kyk na die sukkelende mielies op sy pa se lappie grond en besef dat die bestaansboerdery van sy bawu en dié se bawu voor hom nie langer volhoubaar is nie. Hy besluit om stad toe te gaan waar hy geld kan verdien wat hy weer in hulle boerderytjie sal kan inploeg. Met die belofte dat hy sal terugkom én sy verlore broer Mfazwe, wat jare gelede in die stad weggeraak het, sal saambring, vertrek Kolisile vol moed en geesdrif – net om deur die harde werklikheid van die stad ontgogel, getemper en uiteindelik geknak te word.

Op die Johannesburgse myne beleef Kolisile die armoede en uitsigloosheid van plakkersdorpe, ervaar hy die rassisme en uitbuiting van die apartheidsbestel aan eie lyf, word hy vir die eerste keer met werklike haat vir die ander gekonfronteer en sien hy die aantrekkingskrag van misdaad, leuns en drankmisbruik as ontsnaproete uit die byna ondraaglike werklikheid vanuit sy broer Mfazwe se perspektief. Wanneer hy uiteindelik weer sy weg na die Transkei toe vind, is dit – soos wat sy pa gevrees en voorspel het – as ’n liggaamlik én geestelik gewonde mens.

Akbar Manzil was once the grandest residence on South Africa’s east coast near Durban. Nearly a century later, when Sana and her father move to the house, the latest of Akbar Manzil’s long list of tenants, it is in near-ruins, crumbling, shabby and dark. This is a place where people come to forget. Or to be forgotten.

Full of questions about her new home, Sana is drawn to the deserted and eerie east wing, home to a clutter of broken and abandoned objects – and to the locked door at its end, unopened for decades. Soon, Sana begins to discover the tangled, troubling history of the house, awakening the memories of the house itself and dredging up old and terrible secrets that will change the lives of everyone – living and dead – at Akbar Manzil.

Sublime, heart-wrenching and lyrically stunning, The Lost Love of Akbar Manzil is a haunting love story and a mystery, all intertwined beautifully into one young girl’s search for belonging.

Jacki de Wet is verslaaf aan die internet en sosiale media. Van Facebook, Instagram, X en TikTok weet sy genoeg om gevaarlik te wees. Sy en Pulani vorm ’n formidabele span en hou Die Boekhoek aan die gang. Miskien moes iemand vir Gary, Jacki se baas en verloofde, gewaarsku het toe hy ’n affair met Sally Smith wou begin. “Ebony and Ivory” laat nie met hulle mors nie.

Om van Gary se skelmpie ontslae te raak, is maklik genoeg, maar wat doen sy met die verraad en die woede? Nou sit Jacki sonder iemand om haar ’n bietjie vas te hou, sonder werk en sonder ’n huis. In Tamatiestraat.

Toe die musikant Giovanni Ignacio Mancini sy verskyning maak, verwar hy haar verder. Hy is soos die mooie Vivaldi-musiek wat hy op sy Stradivarius-viool speel – soms guitig of baldadig, soms strelend, smeulend, altyd sensueel. En dan is daar Sebastian, die wonderkind, wat eintlik maar net ’n seuntjie is met ’n groot hartseer.

Jacki sing falsetto, sy weet nie waar sy inpas nie. Sy wil ’n sushi-en-sjampanje-lewe hê, maar die wasabi brand en gee haar sooibrand … en eintlik is sy net ’n vis-en-tjips-meisie.

Ou geraamtes en nuwe gevare. Mevrou Smit moet haar eie reëls neerlê om te oorleef ...

’n Vloed spoel ’n dekades oue geraamte op die oewer van die rivier oop en Aronspoort is weer vasgevang in ’n blyspel van intriges. Mevrou Smit wil die raaisel oplos voor sy weer paaie kruis met daardie lastige Kaapse speurder.

Intussen kry Hester die ystervark ’n maat en mevrou Smit se smeulende verhouding met dokter Tomas vat vlam. Maar dit is moeilik om op hartsake te konsentreer terwyl ’n moordenaar koelbloedig die verlede probeer toesmeer.

Skuil daar meer agter oom Apie se dood? Wat weet tannie Annatjie en haar heldersiende niggie Hanna? Was die vars sterfte op die dorp werklik ’n ongeluk? En kan die verhouding tussen mevrou Smit en dokter Tomas tot iets lei wat haar uiteindelik op Aronspoort sal anker?