Die wonderwêreld van Willem Landman gaan onder andere oor Mintaka, een van drie sterre in Orion se gordel. Dis eintlik tweelingsterre, die een ʼn bloureus, die soldaat, en die ander sagter, vriendeliker. Dit speel op die twee broers in die boek: Alex, meestermanipuleerder en sy afwesige broer, Zander.

Alex het vir hom ʼn aansienlike sakeryk uit gekonkel opgebou. Hy het vir hom ʼn vesting op ʼn koppie gebou nadat hy Bella, die Griekwa-vrou aan wie se familie die grond reeds geslagte behoort, bedrieg en die munispaliteit omgekoop het. Van daar bedryf hy sy sake en daarheen laat kom hy sy “agente”. Hy is magsbehep en ʼn sekspes. Hy is ook psigoties, bossies en vermoedelik skisofrenies.

Die karakter wat die kollig steel, is die titelkarakter, Willem Landman – een van Alex se agente. Lesers het hom leer ken as die sukkelende kulkunstenaar in Die formidabele Ling Ho. Willem is ʼn formidabele bullshitter, ’n stiksienige siener wat moontlik, per ongeluk, wel oor sekere gawes beskik, effens kommin, ongeleerd maar vol planne en ʼn oog vir ʼn gaping. Onrus broei in die gemeenskap en dinge word op die spits gedryf wanneer ’n hele paar agente tegelyk by Alex se vesting byeenkom.

Shona Shah’s life is chaotic. She is shackled to a family obligation, has a casual relationship with a childhood friend, Senthil Aiyer, unfulfilled dreams and a heap of clothing at the bottom of her cupboard that she doesn’t have time to hang up.

In a bold move, Shona walks out of her family’s tailor business to forge her own path. But the beautiful, twenty-something bridal designer soon realises that to move forward, she has to look at her family’s past.

Shona’s journey of self-discovery is a whirlwind of humour and heartache as she learns to accept that her ‘no pillow talk’ rule with Senthil can be broken. Sen discovers that sometimes the greatest love stories can unfold right in the middle of the ‘chaos’ that he has always tried to avoid.

This is a modern story about love and friendship, following your passion and embracing the unpredictable journey of life.

Pillow Talk is the first of a series set in the fictional town of Rally in KwaZulu-Natal from the new queen of South African romance.

There’s a hierarchy to fame – from the Real Celebs who sell their skills as actors and singers, to the Professionally Pretty (the garnish to any occasion), the Hashtag Hustlers, who range from influencers to the social media savvy, to the Hopeless Hangers-On. Everyone has their place in the ecosystem, and knowing your place in that hierarchy is half the fame game won.

For three young women in Joburg, the new age of internet celebrity presents them with obstacles, opportunities, opulence and a chance at fame, fortune and fierce fashion.

LIN
Through sheer ambition and force of will, Lin has rebranded her entire existence. She’s shrugged off her past to fully embrace a new identity: Linfluencer, the high-end influencer whose Outfits Of The Day are obsessively followed by every budding fashionista with a blossoming social media addiction.

LEBO
Then there’s Lebo, who has only ever known a life of fame – real fame – as the former child prodigy behind TV phenomenon Sedi Star. Everyone grew up watching her every move, but now, as she’s grown up, the work, roles and offers have evaporated. But her penchant for scandal, controversy and social media squabbles have kept her in the headlines.

MBALI
And finally there’s South Africa’s reigning Queen of Gossip: Mbali. The entertainment site she runs with an iron fist is known for breaking the hottest news – and the odd celebrity career. With the Hashtag Hustle threatening her media empire, how will she continue to keep her readers enthralled?

As Lin, Lebo and Mbali jostle to take their places in the fame hierarchy, their ambitions, aspirations and agendas collide. Their wins and woes not only affect one another, but can mean that they either individually rise or collectively crumble. Will Lin’s past threaten her future? Will Lebo’s (self-)sabotage prevent her return to the top? Will Mbali’s reign as the Queen of Gossip continue – or reach a dead end? The choices they make can balance or break their entire ecosystem.

’n Nuwe uitgawe van die geliefde roman, wenner van die ATKV-prys vir Liefdesromans.

Die Tweede Wêreldoorlog verdeel die wêreld, dit skeur gesinne uitmekaar. Binne hierdie milieu maak ons kennis met De Wet en Klara, Gerbrand en Christine – jongmense met drome en aspirasies wat elkeen op ’n unieke manier deur die oorlog beïnvloed word.

Wanneer ’n Italiaanse krygsgevangene op die Fouries se Bosveldplaas ’n klipbrug oor die Nyl moet kom bou, ontmoet hy vir Klara en vind in haar ’n geesgenoot . . .

Dekades lank het Peet van Jaarsveld sy bokplaas Syferfontein in die Karoo met 'n ysterhand bestuur. Na die afsterwe van sy eggenoot leef hy in toenemende isolasie van sy kinders en die gemeenskap en probeer homself probeer oortuig dat sy dade en ongenaakbare houding teenoor ander verantwoord is.

Tydens Geloftenaweek in 1960 gebeur daar enkele dinge op sy plaas wat sy ouderdom, eiesinnigheid en verval onder die vergrootglas plaas. Syferfontein is die noukeurige en vaardige bestekopname van die herinneringe, denke en drome van ’n bejaarde man en vertel die verhaal van die uiteindelike ondergang van ’n patriargale Afrikaner oor die tydsverloop van 'n enkele naweek.

In hierdie tragedie waarin Peet van Jaarsveld van sy verlede rekenskap neem, wys outeur Cas Wepener ons 'n wereld en 'n denkwyse wat op makabere manier sowel vertroud as vreemd is.

Een middag terwyl Carmi Molenaar, ’n eerstejaarstudent op Potchefstroom, diep ingedagte op haar fiets ry, kruis haar pad met dié van Herman Hattingh. Al het hierdie senior regstudent al die eienskappe van ’n droomman, laat Carmi se verantwoordelikhede min tyd of ruimte vir romanse.

Die lewe deel egter links en regs klappe uit, en Herman is elke keer dáár om te help wanneer Carmi hom nodig het. Maar sal hulle kan leer om mekaar te vertrou?

Op 25 is Rebecca Fagan in besit van 'n regsgraad, 'n rugsak, 'n groot mond en baie guts.  Sy het twee jaar lank druiwe gepluk in Frankryk, in Italië op 'n olyfplaas gewerk en in Duitsland was sy 'n kelner.  Maar nou is sy terug in Suid Afrika en sy soek 'n “regte” werk.  Toe sy hoor dat Julian Hoffman, derde geslag erfgenaam van ‘n multibiljoenrand-maatskappy, op soek is na 'n persoonlike assistent, besluit sy om aansoek te doen.  Wie nie waag nie, sal nie wen nie, is haar leuse.

Ná drie jaar op ’n passasierskip smag Jean Botha na ’n plek wat syne is en waar hy gewoon net mens kan wees. Tans verkeer hy elders: iewers en tegelykertyd nêrens.

Die oomblik toe hy terug op eie bodem vir Renette Brink op Stellenbosch ontmoet, weet Jean een ding vir seker: Hy sal haar nooit weer kan vergeet nie. Maar Renette is verloof aan Martin Hoogendyk, ’n gesiene boer van die Oos-Vrystaat.

Toe sy vriend Duncan Weston aanbied dat Jean op sy plaas naby Bethlehem gaan toesig hou oor die bedrywighede daar, gryp hy die die geleentheid dadelik aan. Op Heuningkrans slyp hy sy nuutgevonde kunstalent en begin sy eie skilderye te verkoop. Hy besoek selde die dorp en vermy so enige onverwagse herontmoeting met Renette.

Intussen is onheil besig om in die pasgetroude Hoogendyks se huishouding te ontvou. Gaan Renette betyds die regte besluit maak?

’n Meesleurende roman oor twee mense wat hulself vir die keuses van die verlede moet vergewe voor hulle ’n ware tuiskoms en liefde kan vind.

Kassie has never had to cope with a case like this before, and his emotions are getting the better of him. As a rookie cop he learned to keep his distance from a case, not get emotionally involved, because that’s when mistakes happen. But this case makes distance impossible . . . children’s lives are at stake. And every time he and Rooi seem to be making progress with the case, it slithers out from under them, like a venomous snake.

Soois Swart bedryf sy sukkelende koerantjie op die dorpie Erdvark in die Knersvlakte waar die afwesigheid van moderne tegnologie groot uitdagings aan hom stel. Met die naderende munisipale eleksie vermenigvuldig sy kopsorge.

Vir die eerste keer in ’n dekade word die regerende BA Minus deur twee ander partye teengestaan. Burgemeester Duimpie du Plooy dreig om sy kompos-onderneming se advertensies uit die koerant te onttrek indien hy ontevrede is met wat Soois skryf.

Soois moet ’n koorddans uitvoer tussen goeie joernalistiek en beriggewing wat nie aanstoot gee nie. Geensins ’n maklike taak nie, gegewe die talle strydpunte – die brandenste een die afwesigheid van spoeltoilette op die dorp. Die BA Minus is vurige kampvegters vir die
behoud van kleinhuisies en die opposisie driftige voorstanders vir vernuwing.

Wanneer ’n horingadder in ’n kleinhuisie sy tande in ’n kwesbare deel van ’n inwoner slaan, klap die eerste eleksieskoot amptelik. Van daar af gaan dit doller as kopaf.

Ná ’n meteoriet op ’n plattelandse dorp neerstort, kom soek ’n komponis inspirasie vir die klankbaan van ’n wetenskapsfiksiefliek. Hy loseer by ’n astronoom wat navorsing oor gravitasiekolke doen. Haar agtjarige seun praat nie.

Die astronoom wil van haar verlede ontsnap. Die komponis het ’n toekoms wat hy nie wil trotseer nie. In die onmoontlike “nou” ontstaan ’n aarselende verhouding tussen dié twee beskadigdes; wentel hulle om mekaar met kragte wat tot vernietiging óf vernuwing kan lei.

Owami has been happily married for years, until she gets blindsided by her husband’s infidelity. She is pressured into staying in the marriage even though their relationship never fully recovers.

On the other side of Johannesburg, Akani is experiencing marital problems of his own. Having left his job to start his own company, his usually supportive wife becomes less so the moment she becomes the breadwinner.

And then, fortuitously, Owami and Akani’s paths cross. They begin a passionate relationship, one that their respective marriages can’t put asunder. Meanwhile, in a restaurant, a man and woman are flipping a coin to determine who should be killed first by the hitman they’ve hired . . .

All relationships are complicated. But if you had to make a choice, what would you decide: love, marry or kill?

’n Groep jong Suid-Afrikaanse Jode, die teiken van ’n terreuraanval in Kairo, is die vlam in ’n kruitvat vir grootskaalse oorlog in die Midde-Ooste. In die middel daarvan, die joernalis Ruby Heyns, in besit van verdoemende inligting wat die skaal in dié konflik kan swaai.

Wanneer Ruby Heyns oornag verdwyn, moet Staatsekuriteit se Reuben Kruger al sy tegniese kennis inspan om haar spoor op te tel. Spanning en aksie uit die boonste rakke!

Dirk Aruseb was seventeen years old when Abraham Morris fetched him from the Pella orphanage to join the Bondelswarts. Dirk couldn’t wait to conquer the accursed Schutztruppe alongside legendary Kaptein Jakob Marengo, successor to Hendrik Witbooi and Jonker Afrikaner. But when he arrived at Schansvlakte deep in Namaland, Dirk was warned that he first had to master many life skills before he could join the war: be humble, be patient, be merciful. Find your eland, tame your butcherbird.

But for Dirk war was an adventure – as long as he could kill the German enemy, he was content. It didn’t matter what commander Nana Kruiper, or Klara Morris, her second in command, tried to teach him: that the liberation struggle of the Bondelswarts meant more than protecting Namaland – their promised land – at all costs.

Crimson Sands is set in Namaland – from German-South-West Africa to the Cape Colony – from 1904 to 1922, when thousands of Bondelswarts were shot down by Jan Smuts’s fighter planes. It is an epic, panoramic war novel, traversing southern Africa from Tsumeb to Upington, from internment camps in Windhuk to the dry riverbeds of the Fish River Canyon. Jeremy Vearey conjures a mesmerising tale across an arid landscape of sand, shrub and dune, evoking voices and stories long gone.

Brenda has always worked hard to fit in – from her school days, when her talent in athletics gave her access to a richer world, to marriage to her soulmate, which bound her to that world.

It’s hard to know how much of her discomfort comes from the ongoing presence of Denver in her life. From the time when they were the two fastest girls in the athletics team, through years of marriage and parenthood, Denver has always offered friendship, worthy competition … and simmering resentment.

When Brenda realises that Denver is a threat to her family’s wellbeing, there’s nothing she won’t do to protect them. And Denver will do anything to protect herself. After years of rivalry, who will cross the finish line first?

Wanneer ’n nuuskierige toeris aan Zanzibar se kus vermoor word, peul die vreemdste karakters uit die spesery-eiland se tropiese woud.

Die bou van Giorgio Comaneti se blinknuwe Zanzibar Zen Casino gaan die helfte van die Jozani-woud uitwis. Toast le Roux, omgewingsjoernalis, moet die stootskrapers betyds stop.

Maar Comaneti se gevaarlike handlangers, Tjokkie en Bozo, is reeds op Toast se spoor. En hulle wil net vriendelik met hom gesels.

The Near North is a vivid account of life in Johannesburg in times of crisis.

From the stony ridges of Langermann Kop in Kensington to the tree-lined avenues of Houghton, we follow the writer through the city's streets, meeting its ghosts and journeying through time and (often circumscribed) space, finding meaning in the everyday and incidental.

At once an echo of Ivan Vladislavić’s award-winning Portrait with Keys and an original work of intense acuity and quiet power, The Near North is both intimate and expansive, ranging from small domestic dramas to great public spectacles.

Wryly playful at times, fiercely serious at others, it is certain to move and delight all who accompany the writer through its pages.

n Televisieprogram oor die rekonstruksie van skedels dwing Carolien se gedagtes terug na ontstellende gebeure vyftien jaar tevore. En na die vreemdeling wat sy toe geteken het. Die taal van been is 'n roman oor gewone mense se strewe en verlies en die onthutsende werklikheid wat onder die oppervlak skuil. Dis tegelyk 'n speurverhaal met 'n politieke ondertoon, die storie van 'n kunsdosent wat haar werk deur regstellende aksie verloor en 'n eiesoortige liefdesverhaal. Uiteindelik gaan dit egter om veel meer. Hierdie roman bly subtiel spook omdat dit dinge se wat die teks verswyg.

Dr Sara Buhle, a troubled obstetrician, is thrust into a frantic search for a missing newborn in Durban. Sara is pulled into the search by rising SAPS star Vuyi Vilakazi. But with time working against them, and rumours of muthi murders hounding the investigation, the pair find themselves in a race from the city centre and an informal settlement in the Hammarsdale Hills. Mere minutes will make the difference between success and failure.

When an unusual building appeared overnight in a remote northern Cape community in the 1970s, and disappeared a few weeks later, it seemed to point to a series of baffling existential overlaps.

Some individuals claimed that occasionally they found themselves on the other side of a restive civil war divide, in identity embodiments that were highly contrary versions of themselves. In other cases, absurd social situations seemed to mock ‘normal reality’ by alternating with it. When a small-town journalist reported on the events, his quiet life became cruelly disrupted by unwanted attention.

Were these accounts imagined or real? Real enough to the eyewitnesses.

Traumatised and adrift, the journalist wrote up his story in reportage style when a childhood friend invited him to recuperate on her farm. He believed he had narrowly escaped the disappearance of an entire region – a place nobody has ever heard of – and its people, including the love of his life. As the mystery unfolds, with an aura of retrieved memory, the narrator’s lost love becomes an increasingly evocative presence. The Equality of Shadows is a compelling novel – in some places uproariously funny, in others filled with deep pathos – about the vagaries of identity, love and time.

Shelley Jacobsen is in her 40s and feels trapped. The coffee and décor shop that she opened with her bestie is proving to be a gilded cage. Meanwhile, her husband is consumed with Jewish guilt since having their twins, which reminds Shelley that she will always be a Shiksa to his family. Then she hires Wayde Smith, a sexy 22-year-old surfer who smells like a Pina Colada Coconut Vanilla Dessert, as a barista. He makes her feel young and Shelley just wants some fun. But will it stay harmless?

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?

Draairivier, Engela Ovies se debuutroman, is ’n deernisvolle verhaal oor familie, vriendskap, liefde en vergifnis. 

Orphan sisters chase monsters of urban legend in Bloemfontein.

At a busy taxi rank, a woman kills a man with her shoe. A genomicist is accused of playing God when she creates a fatherless child. Intruders is a collection that explores how it feels not to belong. These are stories of unremarkable people thrust into extraordinary situations by events beyond their control.

With a unique and memorable touch, Mohale Mashigo explores the everyday ills we live with and wrestle constantly, all the while allowing hidden energies to emerge and play out their unforeseen consequences.

Intruders is speculative fiction at its best.

Annelie Botes se afsterwe op 12 Desember 2024 het die einde van ’n era ingelui. ’n Era van byna meer as twee dekades waarin sy gedagtes, opinies en insigte oor die lewe met ’n toegewyde lesersgehoor gedeel het. Vir Afrikaans lesers was haar weeklikse rubrieke ’n bron waaruit hulle mildelik geskep het om sin te maak van die wêreld en om inspirasie te vind sodat hul eie skale kon balanseer.

Die rubrieke in hierdie bundel het van 2020 tot 2024 verskyn en volg op Voetstoots, ’n keur van Annelie se rubrieke tussen 2006 en 2020. Vir die menigte lesers vir wie Annelie se stem oor die jare ’n vertroude instelling geraak het, is haar menings ’n besielende kleinood
waarheen hulle meermale sal terugkeer om woorde te vind wanneer dit in hul eie stemme ontbreek.

Hierdie bundel is ’n versameling kantaantekeninge tydens tydperke van ingrypende inkeer en verlies. In Maart 2020 het die Covid-19-pandemie die wêreld getref – bunkertyd in Annelie se taal. In haar wêreld was die tyd van korona ’n voorspel tot haar eie finale
periode van aflegging, siekte, amputasie en uiteindelik, die onvermydelike seisoen van “die engele met raspervlerke”.