South Africa never was, nor ever will be the Rainbow Nation we believed Mandela dreamt about. But we’ve woken up and grown up and we’re trying to come to terms with this reality.

Kopano has also grown as a writer in the last few years. In Period Pain she has poignantly captured the heartache and confusion of so many South Africans who feel defeated by the litany of headline horrors; xenophobia, corrective rape, corruption and crime and for many the death sentence that is the public health nightmare. Where are we going, what have we become?

Period Pain helps us navigate our South Africa. We meet Masechaba, and through her story we are able to reflect, to question and to rediscover our humanity.

Turning her back on what is considered conventional, Makhosazana Xaba engages with her subject-matter on a revolutionary level in Running and Other Stories.

She takes tradition - be that literary tradition, cultural tradition, gender tradition - and re-imagines it in a way that is liberating and innovative. Bracketed by Xaba's revisitings of Can Themba's influential short story, The Suit, the ten stories in this collection, while strongly independent, are in conversation with one another, resulting in a collection that can be devoured all at once or savoured slowly, story by story.

By re-envisioning the ordinary and accepted, Xaba is creating a space in which women's voices are given a rebirth.

When Laurence Waters arrives at his rural hospital posting, Frank, a fellow doctor there, is instantly suspicious. Laurence is everything Frank is not – young, optimistic and full of new schemes. The two become uneasy friends, while the rest of the staff in the deserted hospital view Laurence with a mixture of awe and mistrust.

The town beyond the hospital is also coping with new arrivals, and the return of old faces. The Brigadier – a self-fashioned dictator from apartheid days – is rumoured to still be alive. And down at Mama’s Place, a group of soldiers has moved in with their malign commandant, a man Frank has met before and is keen to avoid. Laurence wants to help – but in a world where the past is demanding restitution from the present, his ill-starred idealism cannot last.

In gleaming prose Damon Galgut has created a literary thriller out of an unlikely friendship. The Good Doctor is a gripping novelistic high-wire act

It is 1989, a high point of hope in South Africa’s political history. The nation is abuzz with rumours of Nelson Mandela’s imminent release, the dismantling of guerrilla camps and the possibility of peace.

A band of exiled People’s Army soldiers returns to South Africa. After years in Angola they think the change they have been fighting for is finally about to become a reality. They have been ordered to carry and deliver a sealed trunk to an unspecified destination. It is a mission that makes them a target as different parties set out to separate the men from the trunk and its mysterious contents, setting the stage for several fierce conflicts.

The Texture of Shadows explores a world of hardened guerrilla fighters, corrupt police officers, ex-political prisoners and the victims of abuse of a system of bannings and beatings. But there are also cracks in this steel-edged world that hope, love and beauty can fill as the reader is swept up in the story of Chaplain Nerissa Rodrigues and her fellow soldiers.

"I wrestled with life and lost." So begins the story of Michael, a corporate lawyer known to his colleagues and associates as Sir Marvin, who picks his way – sometimes delicately, but more often in his own blundering way – through the unfathomable intricacies that make up a life: love and anger, humility and ambition, trust and distrust, selfishness and selflessness. A flawed individual with an acute understanding of the roads that must be navigated to achieve even the slightest insight into the human condition.

In this study in introspection, embroidered with lyrical prose and astonishing intuition, the hero, meditative and melancholic, is at once both tragic and comic.

Meet Zinhle, the glamorous Siren, as she reels through the highs and lows of fame-seeking in Jozi.

Zinhle lives through a sham marriage, a stint as the lover of a Nollywood high-roller, sex parties, and an affair with a football star. She bed-hops from man to powerful man, overcoming cattiness, rivalry, cheating and dodgy agents, to nab a starring role in Heritage, a highly successful soapie. She has attitude and sass in bucket loads and is never far from the latest front-page scandal.

Siren, Kuli Roberts’s gripping debut novel, is a classic rags-to-riches tale, jam-packed with drama, hot sex and reversals of fortune that will keep readers zipping through the pages until the very end.

Dis twee jaar ná ’n oudkollega Julia en haar seun Rudi se lewe hel gemaak het. Maar die inwoners van Kosmoslaan het herstel en aanbeweeg. Dit blyk op die oppervlak asof dinge weer vreedsaam is in Kosmoslaan.

’n Knorrige man met ’n fyn meisiekind en ’n hartseer verlede trek in Ida se huis in. Vanaf die eerste oomblik wat hy trompop in haar vasloop, ontwrig hy Julia se lewe. Watse verspottigheid laat haar nou skielik op twee-en-veertig in vervoering raak oor ’n befoeterde man? En wie saboteur haar en Rudi se eiendom skielik?

Ida voel en lyk soos ’n ou en halwe vrou na ’n ontdekking. En Alma se Jurie is deesdae so omgekrap dat niemand met hom kan huishou nie. Ellie en Justin smag steeds na ’n baba van hul eie na haar vorige miskraam, terwyl hul grootste wens soos ’n ryp perske in Hugo en Claire se skoot val. Ellie smee egter ’n onverwagse band met ’n kinderhuismeisie wat gereeld by Marella se teruggetrokke seun, Bouwer, kuier. En Bouwer is nie Marella en Lourens se enigste bekommernis nie. Marella voel deesdae nie haarself nie ... Boonop kom Klein-Lourens met groot nuus wat sy en Sabina se lewens kan verander.

Daar is dinge wat broei in Kosmoslaan en die vriende en families tot hulle uiterstes toets. Gelukkig is daar ook engele in Kosmoslaan.

ʼn Feministiese roman vir konvensionele vroue Kantelpunt is die boekstawing van Nellie van der Merwe (gebore Petronella Jacoba van Aarde) se wederopstanding. Nellie is pas 50, ʼn konvensionele, wit, Afrikaanse vrou wat haar lewe lank gedoen het wat almal van haar verwag – sy het stilgebly. Met haar stilte het sy haar plek gekoop in haar huwelik, haar gesin, haar familie, haar werk, in die kerk, in die land, in die samelewing. Maar dan ondergaan sy ʼn histerektomie, en haar wêreld kantel. Sy is losgesny van die ding wat van haar ʼn vrou gemaak het, en daarmee saam raak sy bevry van die stilte.

Sy begin haar stem terugeis, soms met verreikende gevolge, soms teen ʼn ontsettende prys. Sy word gedwing om alles wat sy tot dusver as gegewe aanvaar het te ondersoek, en in die proses moet sy nie net die mense naaste aan haar se aandeel in haar stryd erken nie, maar ook haar eie aandadigheid aan haar lot bepaal. Met elke insident, elke veldslag en elke gesprek tree sy verder weg van die geskiedenis en die konvensies wat haar stom gehou het, en kom sy nader aan die vrou wat sy van die begin af veronderstel was om te wees – die een met wie sý in vrede kan saamleef.

“Daar bestaan by my geen twyfel dat Kantelpunt nog meer suksesvol as Oorlewingsgids vir ’n bedonnerde diva sal wees nie. Dis die soort verhaal wat elke Afrikaanssprekende behoort te lees – vroue en mans.” – Chanette Paul

Nie vir sensitiewe lesers nie.

Samuel has lived alone for a long time; one morning he finds the sea has brought someone to offer companionship and to threaten his solitude …

A young refugee washes up unconscious on the beach of a small island inhabited by no one but Samuel, an old lighthouse keeper. Unsettled, Samuel is soon swept up in memories of his former life on the mainland: a life that saw his country suffer under colonisers, then fight for independence, only to fall under the rule of a cruel dictator; and he recalls his own part in its history. In this new man’s presence he begins to consider, as he did in his youth, what is meant by land and to whom it should belong. To what lengths will a person go in order to ensure that what is theirs will not be taken from them?

A novel about guilt and fear, friendship and rejection; about the meaning of home.

Life wasn't always this hard for fourteen-year-old Mvelo, who lives with her mother, Zola in the shacks on the margins of Mkhumbane township.

There were good times when they lived with Sipho, Zola's lawyer boyfriend. But when the beautiful and mysterious Nonceba Hlathi arrives, Zola has to make a choice. She also has her pride. Now their social grants have been discontinued: the one for Mvelo being underage reared by a 31-year-old single mother, and the other for Zola because of her status. And there is also an elephant growing in their shack as the terrible thing that happened that night in the revival tent remains unspoken.

In her second novel, Futhi Ntshingila once again introduces us to a cast of strong women who have little, but are determined to shape their own destinies.

Set in the taxi industry, the story's main characters are a poor taxi driver, a wealthy taxi owner and the taxi driver's girlfriend.

Crime fiction featuring paranormal elements, The Last Stop combines gritty realism with the magical. It shows what happens between people in times of taxi violence and deals with themes of lust, betrayal and revenge.

The Last Stop is an engaging, clever, interesting and darkly enjoyable read with an incredible plot twist at the end.

The unnamed protagonist of Perfect Hlongwane’s second novel, Sanity Prevail, is admitted to the Psychiatric Ward of a government hospital.

There, he meets an assortment of characters, his fellow patients, and narrates their hilarious, horrific and ultimately tragic stories as relayed to him by themselves. His conflicted feelings about being in the treatment facility, and keen curiosity with regard to the admission stories of his fellow patients, serve as the unfolding plot for his stay in the Psychiatric Ward.

The protagonist agonises about what it means, to be adjudged mentally unwell, by a society whose very foundations seem to him unjust and unhealthy to the point of being bizarre.

A story that seeks to explore what sets individual stories apart, how they converge and collide and ultimately, the dilemma of being alive in the world today, such as it is. A riveting tale about the struggle of a mental patient to wrestle hope from the deepest pit of despair.

Henk Andreas de Melker, eerste museumassistent in 'n klein dorpie in die Oos-Kaap, kry onverwags 'n brief van 'n juris in Nederland. Die brief lig Henk in dat hy sy lankverdwene Tante Zan se huis in Amsterdam geerf het. Tante Zan met die geheime lewe, waarvan Henk in Amsterdam gaan uitvind. Ook Tante Zan, die aktrise met die onverwoesbare erotiese drif en die politieke aktivis met die voorliefde vir vreemde vriende, soos die rolprentmaker Cecil Dimaggio en die Luandese straatmusikant van die Leidse plein. Ten slotte moet Henk kies of hy in Amsterdam gaan woon, en of hy na Suid-Afrika gaan terugkeer. Maar eers moet hy alles oopvlek wat van hom weggesteek is, en sy eie lewe opnuut leer ken. Sy dertig nagte in Amsterdam verander die besadigde Henk de Melker se lewe vir altyd.

This is a trilogy of Olive Schreiner's farm novels, Undine, The Story of an African Farm and From Man to Man.

The author was pitch-forked into prominence by the publication in 1883 of The Story of an African Farm, originally published under the pseudonym 'Ralph Iron'. The other two novels were published posthumously. Undine was in fact completed before The Story of an African Farm, and many consider From Man to Man, the book she cherished most, to be her best novel.

Karoo Moon is classic Africana by South Africa's first internationally recognised author; and each of the novels has strongly autobiographical elements, helping the reader to understand a remarkable woman who went on to become an outspoken anti-colonial, pro-Boer campaigner during the Anglo-Boer War, South Africa's first feminist, and a prescient supporter of her disfranchised fellow citizens.

Who can ever understand the heart of a mother when she is forced to abort her baby. Furthermore, who can ever understand the emotions of that baby when she finds out thirty- five years later, that she survived three attempted abortions. And then the final discovery: whó is really the Sustainer of Life and Death?

“Tell it just as it happened, Mommy!” Lodene’s urgent voice pleaded with me and I was transported to the events of thirty-five years ago. There is a saying, “The truth shall set you free.” “Does it?” I had to ask myself as I battled through every word. The story is a truly captivating novel of suspense from the pen of a mother who begged the life of her baby from the hand of God. It will enthral readers and you will experience fierce emotions of love, disappointment, pain and hate. Thís true story took place in 1983, when abortion was illegal.

Lonika, a young woman, lost her heart to a respected businessman, Wilhelm. “Lost in love,” is what Stephan would call it with a shrug of his broad shoulders, as he helplessly watches his brother, Wilhelm, change into a cruel, cold hearted spouse who tries his utmost to end the life of his unborn baby in underhanded ways. Lonika’s life becomes a treacherous journey between lies and heartless brutality. She escapes and flees to safety. Enough is enough! A life is taken. A life is given – but at a price. Once again Lonika must stand naked in the face of fierce negotiations.

Willem is ‘n eenkantkind. Sy pa, die formidabele dominee Riaan Cronjé, is die trots van Bijlstad se Moedergemeente. Sy woord is wet; dit bepaal dat Willem in sy voetspore sal volg en ook die kansel bestyg.

By die seunskool tel al die Bybelstudie egter vir niks. Daar is Willem omring deur ’n spul Filistyne wat die see nie kan skoon was nie; tieners met seks op die brein en ’n dialek wat die verf van die mure af laat dop.

Te midde ’n eensame uur in ‘n koffiewinkel, kom sit ’n aantreklike ouer vrou oorkant die kerkseun. Sonder om ’n woord te sê, neem sy ’n hap van sy beskuit, ’n sluk van sy koffie, en verdwyn so gou soos sy verskyn het.

Willem, te oorbluf om enige rooi vlaggies op te let, is natuurlik die volgende dag terug.

Sy ook.

Jy is te naby aan die water,” fluister Paul. “Babers slaap in die modder. Hulle sal wakker word as jy op hulle trap.”

Paul en Dominique se sorgelose kinderdae op ’n Vrystaatse plaas is vir ewig verby wanneer hul ouers se linkse politiek die skoollewe op die dorp onmoontlik maak.

Hulle word weggestuur na kosskole in Natal. Paul is ’n belowende jong digter, sy suster sy vertroueling.

Maar Paul is vol woede en sy ontwaking word ’n afwaartse spiraal. Hulle vlieg London toe om die bedrukking van Suid Afrika te ontsnap, maar hy gaan ook sy dood tegemoet.

Dominique Botha se roerende debuutroman is ’n elegie vir die lewe van haar kleintyd en haar verlore broer. Die boek is op ware gebeure gebaseer.

Hoe gemaak as jy vastrapplek moet kry tussen die Hemel en die Hel? Kliek. En jou lewe verander. Onomkeerbaar. So sal Markus Meyer en Regardt Muller, twee avontuurlustige vriende wat ná matriek by die Britse Weermag aansluit en as lede van die gerespekteerde 3 Valskermregiment in Afghanistan diens doen, weldra leer. Dit is egter eers wanneer stilte oor die slagveld neersif en die gevolge van konflik beredder moet word, dat die wáre vegters na vore sal tree. En daardie slagveld is nie noodwendig in ʼn oorlogsgeteisterde gebied waar die droë hitte iets lewendigs is nie; soms lê dit ook tussen kamerade, gesinslede en verál midde-in die liefde. Want selfs ʼn soen is by tye ʼn landmyn wat afgetrap word ...

Vegters is die merkwaardige verhaal van uitdaging, lojaliteit en deursettingsvermoë. ʼn Verhaal wat die leser deur drie valleie sal neem: van die Gamtoosvallei in die Oos-Kaap na die Sanginvallei langs die Helmandrivier in Afghanistan, tot die Vallei van ʼn Duisend Heuwels in KwaZulu-Natal waar die wêreldbekende Dusi-kanomarathon die twee vriende tot die uiterste sal beproef. Wees gereed om oorbluf te word. Hierdie boek is nie 'n Sondagmiddagpiekniek nie - dis `n ontsnappingsroete deur `n slagplaas. Vegters moet nie verwar word met 'n hedendaagse oorlogboek nie. Die kontraste tussen die drie wêrelde in die teks is hemelsbreed.

Die leser word gelawe met die idiliese Gamtoosvallei, net om weer om sy gemaksone geruk te word na die hel van 'n oorloggeteisterde Afghanistan. Nog min het twee werelde so baie verskil waar die skrywer dit regkry om beide te versoen. 'n Nuwe blik word gegee oor die oorlog in Afganistan, uit die oogpunt van twee Afrikaanse soldate in die Britse leer. Dis'n verhaal van hoop en versoening. Dis mooi. Dis bitter. Dis `n emosionele wipplankrit. Daar is oomblikke van teerheid,maar voor jy te gemaklik raak, word jy aan die bek geruk deur die twee hoofkarakters se ervarings in Afghanistan. Maar dat dit jou gaan by bly en uit jou gemaksone ruk, is gewis.

Redigeerder Louis Esterhuizen - ”Hierdie werk is by verre een van die mees indrukwekkende tekste wat ek tot nog toe die voorreg gehad het om te hanteer.”

Jou buurman dink hy besit die polisie ...

Petra Smit erf onverwags haar oupa se ou werkswinkel in ʼn klein Vrystaatse dorpie. Daar is gelukkig kopers wat tou staan vir die gebou, maar Petra gaan, heel nuuskierig, kyk na hierdie eiendom waarvan sy nie glad nie geweet het nie. Daar aangekom, ontdek sy die erf vol motorwrakke wat aan die plaaslike slagter behoort. Dié einste slagter is ook die buurman, hy is 'n vroueslaner en hy skeep sy seun, Monty, af, maar hy het kontant en staan gereed om Smit Motors te koop. Petra, wat baie lief was vir haar oupa, wil nie die erflating aan so 'n persoon verkoop nie en 'n mini-oorlog breek uit. Dinge word nog moeiliker toe Arno, 'n reus van 'n man met die psige van 'n kind, aan haar deur kom klop. Hy wil help. Die reus maak homself tuis en word vriende met die slagter se seun, Monty. Petra hoort nie in hierdie dorp nie. Sy mis haar mooi meisie en die roman wat sy wil skryf, bly tweede kom in die oorlog met die slagter. Die slagter hoort wel op die dorp. Hy ken die polisie en intimideer almal. Sal die vreemde Petra en haar twee nuwe maats, Arno en Monty, die oorlog kan wen?

Die boek word uit verskeie perspektiewe vertel. Petra is een perspektiefkarakter, so ook is die Johanna, Monty se oppasser. Aan die ander kant van die wêreld bly Susan, ʼn kunstenaar, vasgevang in ʼn luukse Sweedse kunstepark, nog 'n perspektiefkarakter. Wat het hierdie vroue met mekaar in gemeen? Hoe bind Smit Motors hulle almal? Smit Motors is toeganklike literêre fiksie. Réney Warrington slaag daarin om die spanning snaarstyf te hou, terwyl die leser die speurwerk moet doen, wetende dat iemand se bloed sal moet vloei. Die vraag is: Wie s'n?

For the first time, K. Sello Duiker’s well-known The Hidden Star is now available in isiXhosa.

This is a book of questions and answers. But you already know what you want to ask, which is why you are reading. In fact, the truth is that you already know the answer to your question – you just have to listen to yourself.

Eleven-year-old Nolitye’s granny used to say: if you mess with a woman, you mess with a stone. When Nolitye finds a magical stone on the dusty streets of Phola, her granny’s words take on a new meaning. Along with her two friends – the somewhat pampered Bheki, and Four Eyes, a reformed member of the Spoilers gang led by Rotten Nellie – Nolitye puts the powers of the stone to good use: for the first time the threesome can stand up to the Spoilers; Nolitye can save the life of Rex, the leader of a pack of talking township mutts; and dare to look scary MaMtonga with her living brown-and-green snake necklace in the eye.

But soon Nolitye finds out that the purplish-blue magic stone is but five stones needed to put right things that started to go wrong the day her father died in a mining accident when she was five years old. Or so she was told by her mother ...

By merging a cast of characters straight out of African myth folklore with everyday township life, K. Sello Duiker created a magical world and a truly wondrous quest, a timeless tale that will appeal to an ageless audience.

Bongani and Thando are a loving couple, wonderful parents and each running their own successful businesses. They have it all until one chance encounter with a business associate changes the entire course of their lives.

It forces them to question the status quo and make drastic changes that end up having a great impact on those closest to them.

Will they stay and try to figure out how to exist in the new normal? Or do they follow their hearts and live their Truth.

Toe Daan van der Walt, ’n eerstydse Kalahari-boer, ’n vertigo-aanval kry, laai sy vervreemde seun hom by ’n monnikeklooster in China af. Onder leiding van Meester Yang moet Daan tai chi doen in ’n poging om sy balans te herstel. Maar daar is ook iets anders wat aan Daan vreet, iets wat hy van sy hart móét afkry voor hy sy weg na die hiernamaals kan vind. Dalk is dit tyd dat hy aan Magrieta, sy oorlede vrou, skryf en sê dat hy haar liefgehad het.

In Die Dao van Daan van der Walt word die Afrikaner-dilemma in die moderne lewe met ’n fyn lem oopgevlek.

Temperature is the result of the Karavan Stories Workshop & Anthology project, now in its second year.

The theme – temperature – was inspired by global and intimate, personal developments. Climate change continues to dominate our weather and news cycles. Heated international debates require cool and collected thinking for the sake of all our futures around the world. It has been an exceptionally difficult year for many – what allows us to survive, and thrive, is the warmth and kindness of our connections. Temperature is a testimony to this simple truth.

The stories which emerged interpret ‘temperature’ in the most innovative ways, but they have one thing in common: hot off the press, they inspire reflections on interdependence – between individuals, communities and continents, as well as between humanity and our environment.

Contributing authors include: Sue Brown, Christine Coates, Gail Gilbride, Kerry Hammerton, Karen Horn, Karen Lijnes, Ciaran R. Maidwell, Firdose Moonda, Consuelo Roland, Anne Schlebusch, Joëlle Searle, Philisiwe Twijnstra, Alexandra Wood.