Unrecognised, ignored and forgotten. The Forgotten Scientist: The Story of Saul Sithole is the untold story of a pioneering black scientist who made a great contribution to the fields of anthropology and ornithology in South Africa. Saul Sithole was so committed to his craft that even the weight of apartheid did not stop him from giving 62 years of his life to the scientific world of birds and fossils. Saul never received the official recognition he deserved - until now. This book validates his contribution, sharing his life's work and laying out a story that will inspire future generations of scientists. This book would not have been possible without the support of Biblionef and funding from the National Heritage Council.

A tribute to her father, Makaziwe Mandela shares the most definitive portrait of Nelson Mandela to date, revealing the man behind the anti-apartheid movement that changed the world.

One of Time magazine’s Most Important People of the Twentieth Century, Nelson Mandela continues to be a symbol of equality and justice: a Nobel Prize winner, South Africa’s first Black president, and an unrelenting leader in the movement to dismantle racial inequality. Written by his daughter, her story uncovers the family man behind the international peacemaker persona.

This volume presents an extraordinary assembly of historic biography and imagery alongside never-before-published family stories and personal photographs, Nelson Mandela’s letters to friends and family, journal entries written during his incarceration, and a unique collection of rarely seen charcoal drawings and paintings he began at 83 years old. Chapters chronicle Mandela’s childhood growing up in Mvezo, his time in Johannesburg as leader of the African National Congress, the importance of his familial relationships, decades of imprisonment, and his role as president and philanthropist. An enthralling read illustrated by powerful historic imagery, this tome delves into the life of the man that continues to galvanize so many.

Unrecognised, ignored and forgotten. The Forgotten Scientist: The Story of Saul Sithole is the untold story of a pioneering black scientist who made a great contribution to the fields of anthropology and ornithology in South Africa. Saul Sithole was so committed to his craft that even the weight of apartheid did not stop him from giving 62 years of his life to the scientific world of birds and fossils. Saul never received the official recognition he deserved - until now. This book validates his contribution, sharing his life's work and laying out a story that will inspire future generations of scientists. This book would not have been possible without the support of Biblionef and funding from the National Heritage Council.

Unrecognised, ignored and forgotten. The Forgotten Scientist: The Story of Saul Sithole is the untold story of a pioneering black scientist who made a great contribution to the fields of anthropology and ornithology in South Africa. Saul Sithole was so committed to his craft that even the weight of apartheid did not stop him from giving 62 years of his life to the scientific world of birds and fossils. Saul never received the official recognition he deserved - until now. This book validates his contribution, sharing his life's work and laying out a story that will inspire future generations of scientists. This book would not have been possible without the support of Biblionef and funding from the National Heritage Council.

After working closely with the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation in shaping and writing his memoir, author Hassen Ebrahim and Jacana Media are proud to publish this important record of a life that was spent in service to South Africa.

Writes Mac Maharaj in his foreword in the book: “Hassen Ebrahim is one of those many seldom heard of foot soldiers of the 1976 generation who joined the underground and was linked to the ANC structures operating from Botswana. He has been at the coalface of so many facets of South Africa’s march to freedom. He was there during the times when involvement in the struggle against apartheid carried the risk of death; he was involved in our negotiated transition to democracy; he was the chief executive of the elected Constitutional Assembly which wrote and adopted our Constitution; thereafter and until 2007 he served in the Department of Justice.”

From Marabastad to Mogadishu: The Journey of an ANC Soldier chronicles an all-too familiar story of those unsung cadres from the struggle we’ve forgotten to honour for their sacrifices. Those foot soldiers do not feature in our collective memory, they do not find themselves or their stories recorded in the pages of history books, and they are not remembered for their selfless acts of bravery.

The bravery and sacrifice of the ordinary teenager who dropped out of school, the cadre who risked life and limb, and the freedom fighter who exiled himself or herself to countries far and wide must be given a chance to live on book pages, find expression on film reels and all other mediums of historic memory collection.

From Marabastad to Mogadishu: The Journey of an ANC Soldier signals the resolve by the author, his peers, Jacana Media and support organisations such as the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation to bring the ordinary cadre’s story to the fore, to acknowledge his or her sacrifices, and to recognise their contribution to South Africa’s democracy.

In his memoir, Jaki Seroke shares the joys and the sorrows of his life, starting with his childhood in Alex, where he is born as ‘a poor mother’s son’. He recalls the political battles among the various Africanist groupings, his incarceration on the Island and his later work at Skotaville Press, as publisher and poet.

After 1994, having decided that parliamentary politics were not for him, he joined the corporate sector and committed to a new kind of struggle.

Like so many of her generation, Lwando Xaso came of age alongside the beginnings and growth of South Africa’s constitutional democracy. Her journey into adulthood was a radically different one from that of earlier generations, marked by hope that changing perceptions would usher in a new and free society.

Made in South Africa – A Black Woman’s Stories of Rage, Resistance and Progress is a vibrant collection of essays in which Lwando examines with incisive clarity some of the events that have shaped her experience of South Africa – a country with huge potential but weighed down by persistent racism and inequality, cultural appropriation, sexism and corruption, all legacies of a complicated history.

As a young lawyer intent on climbing the corporate ladder, Lwando’s life’s direction was changed by a personal experience of the oppressive capacity of a supposedly democratic government when it unjustly fired a close family friend and mentor from a senior government position. She found herself on his legal team and the turmoil the case created within her led her to further her studies in constitutional law, and to pick up her pen and share with a wider audience her views of what was happening in her beloved country.

Her outlook was further shaped by her experience of clerking at the Constitutional Court for Justice Edwin Cameron, which deepened her respect for the South African Constitution, and what it really means for a resilient people to strive continually to live up to its moral and legal standards.

Lwando’s writing reflects her unflinching resolve to live according to the precepts of our groundbreaking Constitution and offers a challenge to all South Africans to believe in and achieve ‘the improbable’.

The Jacana series of pocket guides is meant for those who are looking for a brief but lively introduction to a wide range of relevant topics of South African history, politics and biography. Written by some of the leading experts in their fields, the individual volumes are informative and accessible, inexpensive yet well produced, slim enough to put in your pocket and carry with you to read.

Steve Biko is often seen as the charismatic leader of the Black Consciousness Movement, who played a useful stopgap role in South African politics in the late 1960s and 1970s. This biography of Biko shows, on the contrary, just how fundamental he was to the transformation of South Africa in the second half of the 20th century – and just how relevant he remains today.

Vir 45 jaar het Freek Robinson die grootste nuusgebeure in die ou én nuwe Suid-Afrika eerstehands beleef. As TV-joernalis en nuusanker was hy ’n gereelde besoeker in miljoene Suid-Afrikaners se huise.

In sy memoires deel Freek dit wat hy agter die skerms beleef het.

Dié boek verweef die lewe en loopbaan van een van ons land se mees gerespekteerde en geliefde joernaliste en gee ’n besonderse blik op die ingrypende nuusomwentelinge in ons onlangse geskiedenis.

Hans van Rensburg se magnetiese persoonlikheid en sy sterk teenkantingteen Suid-Afrika se deelname aan die Tweede Wêreldoorlog het Afrikaners só aangegryp dat die Ossewabrandwag (OB) binne drie jaar na sy stigting by die 300 000 lede gehad het.

In die vroeë 1930’s was Van Rensburg egter nog deel van die regering en het ’n blink politieke toekoms vir hom gewink. Hy was die jongste Justisiehoof voordat hy as die jongste administrateur van ’n provinsie aangestel is. Hy was ook ’n regsgeleerde, filosoof, taalkundige en taalstryder, bekwame burokaat, militaris, boer, wildjagter en hengelaar.

Sy lewensverhaal strek oor sewe dekades en hy was by al die belangrikste historiese gebeure van 20ste eeubetrokke-van die Anglo-Boereoorlog tot die apartheidsregering.Dit is ’n tydperk waartydens talle “ismes” hoogty gevier het: imperialisme, nasionalisme, nasionaal-sosialisme, kapitalisme, kommunisme en rassisme.

In die verlede is besprekings van Van Rensburg meestal beperk tot sy rol as OB-leier, terwyl hierdie boek ook gaan ondersoek instel na sy rol in die totstandkoming van die apartheidsbewind. Dit is minder bekend dat hy in die vroeë 1950’s as kommissaris van die Groepsgebiederade –’n ankerpunt van apartheidsbeleid –aangestel is.Sy konflik met die verantwoordelike minister, PW Botha, het tot sy bedanking gelei.

Van Rensburg worddikwels as ’n verbete Afrikaner-fascis beskryf, maar die werklikheid is meer kompleks. In vele opsigte was hy dalkeerder ’n gerieflike sondebok vir die Smuts-en Nasionale Party-regerings.

This book lifts the veil on what it’s like to cross a chasm in South Africa - from newspaper editor opposing apartheid repression to adviser in the Presidency and government in democracy.

It is the personal story of Tony Heard, former Editor of the Cape Times, moving from journalist to spin-doctor, consultant, speechwriter and other official business.

His new career covers a decade in the Presidency as a special adviser (2000-2010), and a dozen years in 3 government ministries/departments. In all, he serves governance for 22 years (June 1994 to June 2016), most of the first quarter century of his country’s freedom.

In A Man Apart Richard Steyn once again brings to life a South African icon. Louis Botha was the first Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa, a union he did much to create in the decade after the devastation of the Anglo-Boer War. During the war Botha was a brilliant young Boer general who through his battlefield strategy won significant victories over the British in the early stages of the war. When the weight of British arms overhelmed the Boers, Botha along with Smuts did much to encourage peace between English and Afrikaner and led the country to Union in 1910 and dominion status.

Botha was a big-hearted and generous man who showed magnanimity in his dealings with all, including former enemies. He led the South African troops to victory and the capture of German South West Africa – prior to this he had to put down a revolt of pro-German Afrikaners. At the Peace of Versailles, representing South Africa, he pleaded unsuccessfully for magnanimity towards the Germans. Botha was a globally respected figure – he and Smuts effectively operated as a double act in South Africa and on the international stage before Botha’s untimely death in August 1919 at only 57. In A Man Apart this tragically short life is illuminated in full.

When the Cradock Four's Fort Calata was murdered by agents of the apartheid state in 1985, his son Lukhanyo was only three years old. Thirty-one years later Lukhanyo, now a journalist, becomes one of the SABC Eight when he defies Hlaudi Motsoeneng's reign of censorship at the public broadcaster by writing an open letter that declares: "my father didn't die for this".

Now, with his wife Abigail, Lukhanyo brings to life the father he never knew and investigates the mystery that surrounds his death despite two high-profile inquests.

Join them in a poignant and inspiring journey into the history of a remarkable family that traces the struggle against apartheid beginning with Fort's grandfather, Rivonia trialist and ANC Secretary-General Rev James Calata.

Once, chef Brett Ladds was given a cigar by Fidel Castro, he talked weightlifting with Swazi king Mswati III and his cooking made Quincy Jones sing. For many years he also served Nelson Mandela many cups of rooibos tea and made him his favourite meals.

Ladds was the executive chef of the SA government and manager of the presidential guesthouse at Bryntirion Estate in Pretoria from 1994-1999 where he served both Mandela and Thabo Mbeki. It was a naive and star-struck 21-year-old Ladds who started working at the guesthouse in the months before the first democratic election. During this time he was always in the background when struggle stalwarts like Steve Tshwete, Joe Modise and Dullah Omar met Mandela to discuss the future of the country.

This heart-warming book tells of a young man’s coming of age at a turning point in our history. His stories about meeting kings and queens, presidents, rock stars and even the pope are laced with his unique, self-deprecating sense of humour. Of Queen Elizabeth he says it felt like speaking to his gran. “I asked myself, how does all that power fit into this lovely, caring lady?” Of Robert Mugabe: “He never moaned about a thing.”

Then there are the Russian diplomats and their drinking habits and the Saudi-Arabian sheik who had 8 television sets installed in his room and bought 20 blankets at R5000 each for his stay.

It’s a book to make you laugh and cry. And Madiba’s favourite champagne? Pêche Royale . . .

What kind of president will Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma be if she is chosen at the ANC’s December 2017 congress? She has been fairly media-averse and hasn’t granted many interviews in the past few years, but taking a closer look at her history does provide some clues about the kind of leader she is.

In this book, journalist Carien du Plessis looks at Dlamini-Zuma’s early years, education and involvement in the struggle; her role as a cabinet minister under all four presidents of democratic South Africa; and her achievements as African Union Commission chairperson.

The book considers her feminism and political philosophy; tracks her presidential ambitions and campaigning; and explores how her personal relationship with one of her most important backers, President Jacob Zuma, will influence her leadership.

In her much anticipated memoir, Sisonke Msimang writes about her exile childhood in Zambia and Kenya, young adulthood and college years in North America, and returning to South Africa in the euphoric 1990s. She reflects candidly on her discontent and disappointment with present-day South Africa but also on her experiences of family, romance, and motherhood, with the novelist’s talent for character and pathos.

Militant young comrades dance off the pages of the 1970s Lusaka she invokes, and the heady and naive days of just-democratic South Africa in the 1990s are as vividly painted. Her memoir is at heart a chronicle of a coming-of-age, and while well-known South African political figures appear in these pages, it is an intimate story, a testament to family bonds and sisterhood.

Sisonke Msimang is one of the most assured and celebrated voices commenting on the South African present – often humorously; sometimes deeply movingly – and this book launches her to an even broader audience.

A deeply moving and powerful biography of Fezekile Kuzwayo – better known as Khwezi – the woman the ANC tried to forget.

In August 2016, following the announcement of the results of South Africa’s heated municipal election, four courageous young women interrupted Jacob Zuma’s victory address, bearing placards asking us to ‘Remember Khwezi’. Before being dragged away by security guards, their powerful message had hit home and the public was reminded of the tragic events of 2006, when Zuma was on trial for the rape of Fezekile Ntsukela Kuzwayo, better known as Khwezi. In the aftermath of the trial, which saw Zuma acquitted, Khwezi was vilified by his many supporters and forced to take refuge outside of South Africa.

Ten years later, just two months after this protest had put Khwezi’s struggle back into the minds and hearts of South Africans, Khwezi passed away … But not before she had slipped back into South Africa and started work with Redi Tlhabi on a book about her life. How as a young girl living in ANC camps in exile she was raped by the very men who were supposed to protect her; how as an adult she was driven once again into exile, suffering not only at the hands of Zuma’s devotees but under the harsh eye of the media.

In sensitive and considered prose, journalist Redi Tlhabi breathes life into a woman for so long forced to live in the shadows. In giving agency back to Khwezi, Tlhabi is able to focus a broader lens on the sexual abuse that abounded during the ‘struggle’ years, abuse which continues to plague women and children in South Africa today.

Meet the rebels, artists, troublemakers, athletes, dancing queens and freedom fighters that shaped our past – and are changing our future.

An A To Z Of Amazing South African Women tells the stories of 26 trailblazing South African women through accessible stories and illustrations that are as bright and bold as the women they depict. From Fatima Meer to Caster Semenya, Natalie du Toit to Dope St Jude, this is a book about women who ask too many questions, who defy injustice, who refuse to take no for an answer. It is a celebration of the courage and determination of the activists, scientists and storytellers who have gone before us – as well as a recognition of the everyday heroism of ordinary South African woman doing extraordinary things.

The book takes its inspiration from the worldwide bestseller An A To Z Of Rad American Women and is the work of writer Ambre Nicolson and illustrator Jaxon Hsu, a husband and wife team based in Cape Town.

Allister Sparks joined his first newspaper at age 17 and was pitched headlong into the vortex of South Africa’s stormy politics. The Sword And The Pen is the story of how as a journalist he observed, chronicled and participated in his country’s unfolding drama for more than 66 years, covering events from the premiership of DF Malan to the presidency of Jacob Zuma, witnessing at close range the rise and fall of apartheid and the rise and crisis of the new South Africa.

In trenchant prose, Sparks has written a remarkable account of both a life lived to its full as well as the surrounding narrative of South Africa from the birth of apartheid, the rise of political opposition, the dawn of democracy, right through to the crisis we are experiencing today.

Good Morning, Mr Mandela tells the extraordinary story of how Zelda la Grange’s life, beliefs and prejudices were transformed by the greatest statesman of our time.

It is the incredible journey of an awkward, terrified young typist in her twenties who was chosen to become Nelson Mandela’s most loyal servant, spending the greater part of her adult working life travelling with and caring for the man she would come to call ‘Khulu’.

This is a book about love and second chances. It will touch your life and make you believe that every one of us, no matter who we are or what we have done, has the power to change.

Tony Leon has written a book of unique insight into an unexplored aspect of the presidency and leadership of Nelson Mandela. Opposite Mandela relates the untold stories of how South Africa's first democratic president related to his political opponents.

Leon served as leader of the Democratic Party during Mandela's presidency. Although they clashed, sometimes fiercely, on great issues of the day, Leon enjoyed an unusually warm relationship with Mandela and had direct access to the president's office. In this first-hand account, he relates some of the more consequential moments of those momentous times in South Africa's history-in-the-making through the lens of the opposition. Although this is a personal account, it also explores some of the major themes, from reconciliation to corruption, which not only marked that period but also laid the basis for the current challenges which confront South Africa today, nearly two decades after Mandela assumed the country’s highest office, the very moment when Leon's political leadership began.

Insightful, and simultaneously serious and amusing, it lifts the veil on many unknown or unexplained benchmarks from that era: the personal animosity between Mandela and FW De Klerk, the decision of the Democratic Party to reject Mandela's offer of a seat in his cabinet and whether the extraordinary outreach of Mandela to the minorities was the shrewd calculation of a latter-day Machiavelli or the genuine impulses of a secular political saint. This highly readable and first-hand account considers in a balanced manner both the golden moments and the blind spots of one of the most consequential presidencies and leaders of the modern democratic age.

A magistrate put Glenn Agliotti among the ‘snitches, pimps, rats who would sell their soul to evade a long prison term’. The press called him a drug trafficker and a drug dealer. He was. He’d admitted to these crimes and signed a plea bargain to blow the whistle on an associate. He was also known as the Landlord, which made him sound like a mafia boss.

He was too a facilitator between those in high places, think Jackie Selebi, and businessmen on the make, think Brett Kebble. He was known as a fixer, the go-to guy who commanded fees of R100 million to organise connections.

This is the story of the man who did business in coffee shops and met associates in car parks and underground garages. It is the story of the man who bought shoes for the national commissioner of police. The man accused of the murder of Brett Kebble. This is the story of Glenn Agliotti, one of Johannesburg’s sons of the underworld.

South African Battles describes 36 battles spread over five centuries. These are not the well-trodden battlefields of standard histories, but generally lesser-known ones. Some were of critical importance, while some were infinitely curious.

Who, for instance, has heard of the battles of Nakob, Middelpos, Mome Gorge or Mushroom Valley? Who knows about the four black women that Bartolomeu Dias brought with him on his pioneering voyage of exploration? Who knows that there was a significant battle in what is now the Kruger National Park in 1725? Who knows about the military episode where not a shot was fired but which brought South Africa into the Great War? Who knows that Germany once invaded South Africa?

Written in a light, humorous and personal style, each chapter is self-contained, like a short story. They can be read one a night, and mulled over next day with the promise of further enjoyment to come. South African Battles is an ideal bedside book, as well as an engaging travel companion.

But there is also a twist in the tale at the end. Caveat lector, or lectrix!

In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela describes his house at 8115 Vilikazi Street, Soweto, as '"...identical to hundreds of others... it had the same standard tin roof, the same cement floor, a narrow kitchen, and a bucket toilet at the back". Little did Mandela know when he first moved into the house in 1946 that it would become the stage for some of the most important political events in South Africa's turbulent history and, in recent times, a cultural landmark visited by thousands of tourists each year.

Renowned photographer and close family friend Alf Kumalo captured the day-to-day life of the Mandelas - the raids by the security police and intimate family moments, both of joy and sorrow, as well as Mandela's return to his home after his release from prison in 1990, twenty-eight years after he had left it.

Using this unassuming house as the setting, 8115: A Prisoner's Home collects some of Kumalo's most historically important and beautiful images of the Mandela family and their home, giving us a unique insight into the life of the family who would have a profound effect on South Africa's political landscape.

More than a ringleader, a rabble-rouser and a rebel who knows no bounds, Julius Malema is a new kind of cadre in South African political life, a radical product of 100 years of struggle politics. Whether you love him or loathe him, he is undeniably one of the most controversial politicians of our time and yet he remains an enigma to most.

An Inconvenient Youth traces Malema's life, from his early, poverty-stricken years in Limpopo, to his joining the student structures of the ANC in the early 1990s, and his rapid rise through the party's ranks to become the president of the ANC Youth League in 2008. Forde analyses the sources of Malema's wealth, exploring his seamless approach to business through politics. She situates Malema within the ANC's history and shows in unprecedented detail how he has perfected the practices that characterise a new 'struggle' in which individuals extend their personal wealth and political power at the expense of the people.

This researched account explores how a brave child has grown to become a grave inconvenience, not only to the ANC, but also, due to his style of politics, to South Africa's fledgling democracy.