Lizet Vos ontdek tydens die opruim van haar vermoorde suster se woonstel Marina se kluitklaplys. Hierna probeer sy om alles op dié lysie te doen - al is al die gewaagde, gevaarlike dinge eintlik heel teen haar aard. Haar eie drome skuif sy ver agtertoe. Totdat haar broer Evan se lewe met dié van Anya Breedt verstrengel raak. Nou vorm Stephen en sy dogtertjie Soekie deel van familiekuiers. Stephen spartel om na sy vrou se dood die balle in die lug te hou; hy het geen tyd vir ʼn donkerkop met blou oë wat hom hinder nie. Soekie mag dalk in Lizet se klas wees, maar hy is vasbeslote om juffrou Vos te vermy. Na ses maande kan hy egter die uitnodiging om klasbesoek te doen nie verder ignoreer nie. Vir die lewe om sin te maak, moet Stephen en Lizet beide opnuut hulle eie drome ontdek.

'n Wit man soos Paul is so goed soos kroonwild ... In die vorige bedeling was Paul van Heerden se lewe een van gemak: groot huis in Pretoria se vooraanstaande woonbuurt, vanselfsprekende bevordering in die werk, welvaart en voorspoed. Toe kom die opstande en die grondbesetting. Nou word die Volksrepubliek van Azanie deur Die Party regeer. Alle wit mense is Weskaap toe verban. Die wat in Azanie wil werk, word toegelaat, maar word onderwerp aan dieselfde vernederende praktyke wat gedurende die Apartheidsjare beoefen is. Paul se vrou en kinders sit in 'n tentekamp in die Kaap, hy bly in 'n hostel en sukkel om sy werk te behou. Paul het egter 'n plan: hy begin met mampoer smokkel. Kort voor lank het hy 'n weldoener en sakevenoot in Thabo Ntombela, mampoerstokers en verspreiders. Maar in Azanie wil elkeen sy deel hê en 'n wit man soos Paul is so goed soos kroonwild.

Niemand mag haar sien sonder haar mantel nie.

Gita kruip al haar lewe lank agter voorgee weg; ʼn mantel vir elke okkasie.

Flambojante, pienk-Gita, vir wanneer sy opspraak wil maak, swart-Gita wanneer sy wil wegraak en laag lê, rooi-Gita wanneer sy uitdagend is, en natuurlik die blinkkant-bo-baadjie as sy voor die familie is. Maar agter die mantels spook dit by Gita. Haar pa het weggeloop met ’n ander vrou toe sy tien jaar oud was.

Sedertdien sukkel sy om mense naby haar toe te laat. Niemand mag haar sien sonder ’n mantel nie. Wanneer haar werk deure moet sluit pak sy haar lewe op en vertrek Knysna toe. Daar waar haar pa is. Waar sy nuwe vrou is. Waar sy nuwe kinders is. Langs die pad ontmoet sy die kleurvolle Llewellyn wat haar as verkleurvroutjie sien en sy is heeltemal oukei daarmee. Sy is wel nie oukei met die amper-blinde tjellospeler, Darius, en sy broer wat haar geheime lewe wil oopkrap nie. Skielik is daar vier baie verskillende mans in haar lewe, en Gita het nie genoeg mantels om alkant te dek nie.

Twenty-nine-year-old Themba is a nihilistic, depressed, and suicidal artist whose dream is to become a successful novelist. With all the failure and suffering he's experiencing, it seems as though his life is stuck without any purpose and meaning. Everything seems to be going well for his friends, but not for him. His brother and father hate him for his ambitious but dead dream. Worse, Themba still lives in poverty with his parents in an abandoned house.

However, Themba has one passionate reader of his books, a woman called Yana. She's weird and has no friends, and volunteers at a local orphanage. Yana is the good Samaritan of the neighbourhood, cheerful and happy, but few people seem to like her. Themba begins to question what makes Yana so odd but yet so comfortable with her life even though she doesn't have much to be happy about. His curiosity leads him closer to her, and his life changes forever.

Haar kans op vir ewig en altyd is nou. Vyf jaar na haar egskeiding is Milan 'n bedrywige sakevrou met 'n vol lewe. Estie, Milan se stiefdogter, het pas begin werk as junior rekenmeester met groot drome om die korporatiewe leer te klim. Jessica, Estie se rna, het sewentien jaar gelede haar rug op Vaalkrans gekeer en bestuur nou 'n gewilde trouplaas. Drie suksesvolle vroue met vervulde lewens, of so wil dit voorkom. Vaalkrans en die gebeure van die verlede het egter steeds 'n houvas op elkeen. Milan kan nie vir Herk vergeet nie, en alhoewel sy die seuns gereeld sien, is Estie se verwerping pynlik. Estie is steeds verbitterd teenoor Milan en haar ma, en sukkel met 'n eetversteuring wat besig is om handuit te ruk. Jessica is in 'n rolstoel en aanvaar haar gestremdheid as straf vir die feit dat sy haar gesin versaak het. Die troues wat sy reel, is 'n poging om boete te doen. Wanneer Milan se lewe onverwags ontwrig word, begin die domino's een vir een kantel, en word hierdie drie vroue wie se lewens ineengeweef is, onkeerbaar geraak. Durf hulle 'n kans op geluk, 'n kans op vir altyd, waag?

Toe Elfrieda ná ʼn lang koma uiteindelik haar oë oopmaak, is haar kop leeg. Sy is in ’n Durbanse hospitaal nadat sy voor ’n motor ingehardloop het en die angs pak haar wanneer sy besef sy kan níks van haar verlede onthou nie.

’n Terloopse opmerking deur Michael, die neuropsigiater wat na haar omsien, bring ’n flits herinnering: Voor haar sien sy ’n vaalgroen boekie oor die lewe van die ontdekkingsreisiger David Livingstone se vrou, Mary. Met behulp van Michael begin Elfrieda stadig die legkaartstukkies van haar geheue aanmekaar sit.

Maar soos haar grootwordjare voor haar begin oopspoel, bring die onthou ook hartseer: soos die herlewing van die tragedie van haar pa se ongeluk tydens ʼn vakansie by die see en haar ma se kille verwyt en woede daarna.

Terwyl Elfrieda ’n pad stap – verby die verskrikking van vergeet en die ontsetting van onthou – neem die verhaal van Mary Livingstone vorm aan: van haar grootwordjare op Kuruman in die Noord-Kaap, tot kinders grootmaak in die wildernis van Betsjoeanaland. En deur dit als: David se oorrompelende reisdrif wat hom ’n koers laat inslaan het na ’n plek waarheen sy gesin hom eindelik nie kon volg nie.

13 twisted tales of music, magick, mayhem & murder.

Some torn from headlines in sunny South Africa where, for many, these are part of everyday life.

♠

Shop for shrunken heads in a village that time forgot.

Witness an ancient ritual passed down from the Aztecs through Jack the Ripper to modern-day London.

Savour the sweet taste of revenge in a French restaurant.

Sit in on the Grim Reaper’s disciplinary hearing.

And experience life on the streets in 1980s Hillbrow as two teenagers struggle to survive a violent rollercoaster ride through Johannesburg’s underground club scene.

♠

John West has won awards and even small amounts of money for his scribblings over the years. One of his stories was recently longlisted in the top 200 entries out of 5 000 submitted to the international Commonwealth Short Story Prize.

His first novel – Burning Roses, a decadent tale of sex, drugs, rock n roll & magick – is available online.

When Lily Westwood dies of cancer, her family are plunged into grief and despair. However, it is not only the loss of Lily which causes their desolation - it’s honouring her dying wish that her husband, William, and twin sister, Frith, leave the UK to raise her daughter, Plum, in Lily’s beloved South Africa. Together, William, Frith and Plum must fulfil Lily’s last wish and confront the challenges this presents to each of them.

William, broken and remorseful, buys North Wind Manor, a decaying Edwardian house, and buries his misery in trying to restore the property to its former glory. As the three become immersed in this project, it is clear that William’s obsession with hiding the rot and decay of the mansion mirror his desperation to conceal the misdeeds and wretchedness of his past.

Lily’s identical twin sister, Frith, resents her loss of freedom as she finds herself caring for William and Plum in a damp, gloomy house and a city alien to her. Increasingly she frets over the impact this will have on her spirit and career as an artist. With enormous courage, Frith tries to carve out an identity for herself as her future becomes increasingly tenuous.

Eleven-year old Plum, sensitive, bright, and imaginative falls in love with North Wind Manor at first sight. Upon finding a century-old diary written by the manor’s former occupant, Plum becomes enthralled by the intrigue and history of her new home, so much so, that it consumes her every waking thought until she begins to believe the diary’s author is a spirit inhabiting the manor.

This compelling story interweaves between past and present to explore the twisted dynamics of a family brought closer by sorrow, regret, mortality, love – and an understanding that the truth is not always simple.

Keira en die mense van Walkers Village leer ons dat elke mens 'n kans het om oor te begin. Dat elke mens die reg het om oor te begin.

Vir die inwoners van Walkers Village is Keira se manier van dinge doen aanvanklik baie vreemd en ongehoord. Maar Keira verstaan dat regte mense regte probleme het. En ook dat regte mense soms so 'n bietjie hulp nodig het om die regte probleme op te los. Al klink dit aanvanklik vreemd en ongehoord. Saam met Keira leer ons om te verstaan dat die lewe nie altyd regverdig is nie. Dat goeie mense se paaie soms met donker siele se paaie kruis. Dat ons nie altyd kan kies wie ons pad kruis nie, maar dat ons wel kan kies hoe ons daai pad van ons stap.

Want hoe jy jou pad stap, is wat saak maak. Nie hoe jy jou storie vertel nie.

David shares a close bond with his eight-year-old son, Chris, but their family is destroyed when David dies.

In the afterlife, he is given an opportunity. He is told that he may be granted three viewings by which to look in on his son. The terms are strict: he cannot help his boy. He cannot reach him, or teach him, or in any way change the course of his life. David agrees, and on three separate occasions observes his son’s unfolding story.

The first viewing takes place one year after his own death. The second shows him his son at the age of nineteen. David’s final viewing shows him the final days of Chris’s life.

What David sees will not leave him. He has a simple but impassioned request: ‘Let me take his place’.

Connected by more than their exquisite prose, Nick Mulgrew’s new stories delve into a world of killer eagles, tattoo removal parlours, hardcore punk guitarists-cum-auditors, turtle sanctuaries, plane crashes, amateur pornographers and biltong-makers – a world concurrently too strange and too familiar for comfort. A collection of startling imagination and sympathy – set primarily in South Africa’s least fashionable cities and suburbs – these stories maintain a precarious balance between rich comedy and despair throughout their explorations of grief, spectacle, sex, nostalgia, and the lives of animals, both human and not. With audaciousness met by trademark spiritual undercurrents and poetic flourish, The First Law of Sadness is confirmation of Mulgrew’s status as one of South Africa’s best contemporary exponents of short fiction.

*Winner of the UJ Debut Prize*

Family secrets run deep for Grace, a young girl growing up in Cape Town during the 1980s, spilling over into adulthood, and threating to ruin the respectable life she has built for herself.

When an old childhood friend reappears, Grace’s memories of her childhood come rushing back, and she is confronted, once again, with the loss that has shaped her. The novel is permeated with the long shadow cast by personal trauma, violence and loss on people’s lives.

Impi was born during the Mozambican civl war and was abducted to join renamo as a child soldier. He also participated forcefully in all mutilation and killing activities.

Nomsa is a beautiful college girl who was forced by her parents to marry a man chosen by them. He was from the economic social class as them. While at college she fell in love with Musa whom she loved dearly but her parents instructed her to break up with and follow their orders.

Paul Rayment is on the threshold of a comfortable old age when a calamitous cycling accident results in the amputation of a leg. Humiliated, his body truncated, his life circumscribed, he turns away from his friends. He hires a nurse named Marijana, with whom he has a European childhood in common: hers in Croatia, his in France. Tactfully and efficiently she ministers to his needs. But his feelings for her, and for her handsome teenage son, are complicated by the sudden arrival on his doorstep of the celebrated Australian novelist Elizabeth Costello, who threatens to take over the direction of his life and the affairs of his heart.

Maria was a medical doctor graduate who took over the reins as a chief after the death of her father, Masombuka. While accepting the crown she encountered discrimination and prejudice as a woman.

At the time she became the chief of Masombuka village, traditional norms and cultural practices was against women taking part in any powerful positions in the community. Maria broke all taboo and became the chief, much to the annoyance of her uncle Gwebu who was earmarking himself for that position. When he realised that the traditional house had amended the rules to allow her to sit in the tribal court and preside over all matters pertaining the community, he decided to hunt for Amos. Amos was the son of chief Masombuka who had gone awol with his mother when he was very young. He was actually the rightful heir to take over his father but because he could not be found some of the elders decided to crown Maria.

Gwebu plans to successfully locate Amos, to wage and fuel fire between Amos and Maria.

Valley Of Heaven And Earth is woven with the strands of remembrance from days of earliest childhood, intertwined with perspective and reflection.

Jayson Mayer, the principal character was raised in one of the most magnificent natural environments in the world, on the southern tip of Africa. The fishing village of Hermanus was populated by locals who made up the diverse people of South Africa including a community of several Jewish families who retained religion, tradition and identity in a society fraught with ethnic division and racism. Returning to South Africa, years after emigrating to Israel, memories are reignited.

Drama, comedy and tragedy follow in this compelling work of narrative fiction.

Magaya is the unemployed graduate who lost his parents due to crime and was left with nothing else apart from a four roomed house. The community of Siyabusa adopted him. To thank them he was involved in the fight against crime and drug abuse which saw him recruited full time by crime fighting agencies. Magaya met a love of his life Nozuko, who was a shareholder and Director of Marembera store. The two tired the knot and due to family commitment decided to promote Sbongile, their friend to run the fort on their behalf who stole all the investment and savings.

Gebaseer op die treffer TV-reeks. Jacques Rynhard, een van die land se gewildste skrywers, verdwyn op die kruin van sy loopbaan. Joernalis Carina Human moet uitvind waar hy is, maar meer belangrik, hoekom hy verdwyn het. Sy krap 'n perdebynes oop van verraad, donker geheime, moord en mislukte verhoudings.

Tristan Hansen is 'n man wat R15 000 per nag vra en die land se mees invloedryke en wêreldwyse vroue soveel plesier gee dat hulle terugkom vir meer. Maar wanneer een van sy kliënte haar eie lewe neem, verander die plesierengel in 'n doodsengel, en bely sy kliënte die een na die ander wat agter toe deure gebeur het. Maar waarom doen hy dit? Beslis nie net vir die geld nie. 'n Sielkundige, Erika Hamilton, ontmoet hom toevallig. Albei van hulle bied op beroepsvlak verligting van neurose, onvervuldheid en frustrasie - die een op akademiese wyse, die ander met lyflike plesier. Wat gebeur wanneer hulle ontmoet?

Boelie is Mister Fourie se oudste seun en erfgenaam; Persomi is die bywonerskind. Maar Persomi is slim, waarskynlik te danke aan haar onbekende biologiese pa. 'n Baie spesiale vriendskap ontwikkel tussen Boelie en Persomi, maar iets hou Persomi terug - waarom kan sy nie met oorgawe liefhe nie? En wanneer sy as baie jong prokureurtjie inwillig om die Indierwinkeliers se gedwonge verskuiwing in die hof te beveg, bring dit haar in direkte konflik met die gemeenskap - en met Boelie.

Karl Louw, ʼn prokureur, word deur Helen Brodie genader om haar in ʼn regsgeding te verteenwoordig. Die regsaak veroorsaak dat Karl en sy vrou Wilma ook met ou wonde van die verlede gekonfronteer word: verraad, verkragting, die mag wat mans in ’n patriargale, chauvinistiese samelewing oor vrouens aanvaar.

Terwyl Karl en Helen veg om haar professionele reputasie te beskerm, worstel Wilma met haar eie donker skuldgevoel en probeer haar man se verlede ontrafel. Sy onskuldige en ietwat idilliese skoolromanse is die grondslag vir alles wat Karl glo van die liefde, verhoudings en intimiteit – en die rede waarom Wilma nie haar geheim met hom kan deel nie.

Hoe vergewe jy as daar nie om vergifnis gevra word nie?

The background is the notorious 1971 case in which nineteen citizens of Excelsior in the Free State were charged with breaking apartheid's Immorality Act, which forbade sex between black and white. In an extraordinary alchemy of words into art, Mda tells the story of a family at the heart of the scandal ? of Niki, the fallen madonna, Popi, her daughter by an eminent white citizen of the town, and Viliki, the betrayed son, and of how they come to terms with the repercussions and find resolution in surprising ways.

By turns earthy, witty and tragic, this energetic novel deftly handles issues of racial identity, rape and revenge. It is also a brilliantly observed study of the inner workings of small-town South Africa, and the changes rural communities have undergone.

In a remote mountain village in Lesotho, the beautiful Dikosha lives for dancing and for song, setting herself apart from her fellow villagers. Her twin brother, Radisene, works in the lowland capital of Maseru, struggling amid political upheaval to find a life for himself away from the hills. As the years pass, Radisene's fortunes rise and fall in the city, while Dikosha remains in the village, never leaving and never aging. And through it all, the community watches, comments, and passes judgment.

The focal point of the novel is the small town of Soutbek. Its troubles, hardships and corruption, but also its kindness, strong community and friendships, are introduced to us in a series of stories about intriguingly interlinked relationships. Contemporary Soutbek is still a divided town - the upper town destitute, and the lower town rich, largely ignorant - and through a series of vivid scenes, the troubled relationship between Pieter Fortuin, the town's first coloured mayor, and his wife Anna is revealed. In so many ways the past casts a long shadow over the present, not in the least through the unreliable diaries of Pieter Meerman promoted by Pieter Fortuin and Professor Pearson, a retired white historian. They give us a unique insight into the lives of the seventeenth-century Dutch explorers, and hint at a utopian society, suggesting that Soutbek is the birthplace of assimilation and integration. The blossoming friendship between Anna, Sara, a foundling, and Willem, Pieter Fortuin's nephew, is unsettled by David, Anna's and Pieter's son. His father has bought David a bright future, but when he comes back from boarding school David appears alienated from his father and from his old friend, the former gardener Charles Geduld, just as Anna starts to accept him as her son. Is there hope, or are we left with Willem's conclusion that 'he would spend the rest of his life working off the debt of his family's poverty'? A moving story that paints a thought-provoking picture of life in contemporary South Africa.