In this extraordinary and hopeful book, leading environmentalist Tony Juniper CBE identifies the real problem at the heart of the climate and nature crises.

From soil loss to wildfires, degraded rivers, mass migration and conflict, the environmental crisis is already here - and it's set to get much worse. While billionaires build remote bunkers and make plans for colonies on Mars, climate collapse impacts the most vulnerable among us first and hardest. But what this radical and ground-breaking book proves is that inequality isn't just about who suffers the consequences, it is the main obstacle blocking action - and it has been for decades.

How can people lead good lives without ultimately hastening global collapse? The answer lies in fairness. We can't fight the climate and nature crises without addressing the ever-widening gaps between the rich and poor, the powerful and the weak. Drawing upon more than 40 years of experience in research, practical work, campaigning and advocacy, combined with interviews with globally renowned experts, in Just Earth Tony Juniper reveals the system shifts needed to achieve real, lasting change.

This acclaimed book by Steven Pinker argues that, contrary to popular belief, humankind has become progressively less violent over millenia and decades. Can violence really have declined?

The images of conflict we see daily on our screens from around the world suggest this is an almost obscene claim to be making. Extraordinarily, however, Steven Pinker shows violence within and between societies - both murder and warfare - really has declined from prehistory to today. We are much less likely to die at someone else's hands than ever before. Even the horrific carnage of the last century, when compared to the dangers of pre-state societies, is part of this trend.

Debunking both the idea of the 'noble savage' and an over-simplistic Hobbesian notion of a 'nasty, brutish and short' life, Steven Pinker argues that modernity and its cultural institutions are actually making us better people.

Why do so many South Africans prefer taking the law into their own hands to relying on the police? Why are those who do so often cheered or sympathised with?

Of the unprecedented 27 000 recorded murders in South Africa in 2022, at least 1 894 – or 7 per cent – were attributed to mob justice and vigilantism, more than double the number from five years before. In the first nine months of 2023, a further 1 472 mob justice deaths had already been registered.

Mob justice is nothing new, but in recent years it has taken on an undeniably desperate, furious edge. From the breathtakingly violent Zandspruit massacre in May 2021, to the killings during the July unrest two months later, to the march of Operation Dudula across the nation in 2022, vigilantism – and the condoning of it – has never before captured the zeitgeist of South Africa so sharply. What has changed in the past few years, and what does it augur for the future?

Following three recent cases of mob justice, from the hellish metropolitan townships of Gauteng to the far-flung bushveld of northern Limpopo, and drawing on extensive research and interviews, Why We Kill explores the roots, realities and consequences of South Africa’s current crisis of vigilantism.

Lucy Easthope lives with disaster every day. When a plane crashes, a bomb explodes, a city floods or a pandemic begins, she's the one they call. As one of the world's leading experts on disaster she has been at the centre of the most seismic events of the last few decades - advising on everything from the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami to the 7/7 bombings, the Salisbury poisonings, the Grenfell fire and the Covid-19 pandemic.

She has travelled across the world in this unusual role, seeing the very worst that people have to face, and finding that even the most extreme of situations, we find the very best of humanity. In her moving memoir she reveals what happens in the aftermath. She takes us behind the police tape to scenes of destruction and chaos, introducing us to victims and their families, but also to the government briefing rooms and bunkers, where confusion and stale biscuits can reign supreme.

With wisdom, resilience and candour When the Dust Settles looks back at a life spent on the edges of disaster and shows us that where there is terrible tragedy there is also great hope and that humanity and humour can - and must - still be found on the darkest of days.

"I forgive you."

Three simple words behind which sits an intriguing and complex concept. These words can be used to absolve a meaningless squabble, or said to someone who has caused you great harm. They can liberate you from guilt, or consciously place blame on your shoulders.

Forgiveness can often be perceived as saccharine and overtly religious, something just for the spiritually superior or mentally strong. But really it is a gritty, risky concept that is so often relevant to our ordinary everyday lives. Forgiveness explores the subject from every angle, coming from a place of enquiry rather than persuasion, presenting it as an offering, never a prescription.

Marina Cantacuzino seeks to investigate, unpick and debate the limits and possibilities of forgiveness – in our relationships, for our physical and mental wellbeing, how it plays out in international politics and within the criminal justice system, and where it intersects with religious faith. Cantacuzino speaks to people across the globe who have considered forgiveness in different forms and circumstances. She talks to a survivor of Auschwitz; to someone who accidentally killed a friend; to people who have lost loved ones in acts of violence; to a former combatant in The Troubles as well as to the daughter of someone he murdered.

Through these real stories, expert opinion and the author’s experience from two decades working in this field, the reader gets to better understand what forgiveness is and what it most definitely isn’t, how it can be an important element in breaking the cycle of suffering, and ultimately how it might help transform fractured relationships and mend broken hearts.

The Mending of a Broken Vessel chronicles how the yearn to be loved became something that she chased for, the result of which was a promiscuous lifestyle.

It details the journey of rejection, pain, disappointments, abusive relationships, suicide attempts, alcoholism and many ill that the author fell into and survived.

Where is South Africa going now? And where will South Africa be in five years’ time? Much has been written about the country’s past, but is enough thought being given to its future? Is South Africa in danger of again losing its way, given its pressing socio-economic challenges?

Prominent economist Raymond Parsons has drawn together a powerful collection of expert thinkers, economists and analysts who tackle these issues head on as well as offering timely solutions to several of South Africa’s most pressing problems, drawing key lessons from the past in crystallising what South Africa needs to do to create a better future.

After the so-called ‘lost decade’ under the Zuma administration, South Africans had high hopes that President Ramaphosa would deliver on his promise of a ‘new dawn’. Yet despite high expectations that the country would finally turn the corner and settle onto a path of stronger inclusive growth and better governance, socioeconomic conditions have deterioriated. Growth remains negligible, unemployment has worsened and the fiscus is under considerable strain. Will SA be able to break out of its present ‘growth trap’ without falling into a ‘debt trap’?

The country is also facing global headwinds in the form of volatile market conditions, shifting geopolitics, and a fast-changing and disruptive technological landscape which threatens to leave all but the most well-prepared behind. So how must the different strands of policy – ranging from purely economic issues to broader questions around education and the rule of law – now knit together to create a bigger, stronger and better SA economy in future?

If the vision of a well-functioning society is to be realised, policy uncertainty about the road ahead must be generally tackled at the highest level to facilitate job-rich growth. And business and civil society, in its turn, must take a long-term view of South Africa’s future and commit energy and resources to bringing about change which is both productive and transformational.

Recession, Recovery & Reform will offer compelling new insights into how South Africa can unlock its potential in the years ahead. The publication of this title a month ahead of the ANC policy conference in June 2020, at which President Ramaphosa’s political and economic ‘track record’ will be widely assessed, ensures it will be a must-read for all who are concerned about South Africa’s well-being and who are willing to believe that a ‘new dawn’ is indeed possible.

Youth Revolution is the inspirational story of how a sixteen-year-old high-school student from Johannesburg, Kiara Nirghin, overcame huge health obstacles to win the grand prize at the 2016 International Google Science Fair for her unique and innovative solution to worldwide drought. Having experienced bacterial meningitis, undiagnosed bilharzia and severe weight loss, Kiara was forced to postpone her school career for hospitalisation, with a real chance of losing her hearing, her sight and the use of her limbs.

Youth Revolution not only covers her journey from the hospital bed to the stage as the winner of the science award, but also looks at issues surrounding stagnant youth innovation, while considering the dangers of lacking diversity in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths). It also includes contributions from prominent women in science and education, among them Malala Yousafzai, VP of Education and University Programs for Google and the recipient of the L’Oréal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science.

Youth Revolution is a deeply human and truly inspirational real-life story that will enthral teenagers and adults alike, and proves that even ‘ordinary’ teenagers can do extraordinary things.

There is only one scenario other than an asteroid strike that could end the world as we know it in a matter of hours: nuclear war. And one of the triggers for that war would be a nuclear missile inbound toward the United States.

Every generation, a journalist has looked deep into the heart of the nuclear military establishment: the technologies, the safeguards, the plans, and the risks. These investigations are vital to how we understand the world we really live in—where one nuclear missile will beget one in return, and where the choreography of the world’s end requires massive decisions made on seconds’ notice with information that is only as good as the intelligence we have.

Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen’s Nuclear War: A Scenario explores this ticking-clock scenario, based on dozens of exclusive new interviews with military and civilian experts who have built the weapons, have been privy to the response plans, and have been responsible for those decisions should they have needed to be made. Nuclear War: A Scenario examines the handful of minutes after a nuclear missile launch. It is essential reading, and unlike any other book in its depth and urgency.

The Concise Edition of this huge international bestseller - the 48 laws are illustrated through the tactics, triumphs and failures of great figures from the past who have wielded - or been victimised by - power.

The perfect gift book for the power hungry (and who doesn't want power?) at an excellent price. At work, in relationships, on the street or on the 6 o'clock news: the 48 Laws apply everywhere. For anyone with an interest in conquest, self-defence, wealth, power or simply being an educated spectator, The 48 Laws of Power is one of the most useful and entertaining books ever.

This book 'teaches you how to cheat, dissemble, feign, fight and advance your cause in the modern world.' (Independent on Sunday) The distilled wisdom of the masters -illustrated through the tactics, triumphs and failures from Elizabeth I to Henry Kissinger on how to get to the top and stay there.

Wry, ironic and clever this is an indispensable and witty guide to power. The laws are now famous:

• Law 1: Never outshine the master
• Law 2: Never put too much trust in friends; learn how to use enemies
• Law 3: Conceal your intentions
• Law 4: Always say less than necessary

At a watershed meeting in 2000 the ANC committed itself to "the new cadre" project. A project with the aim to recruit and develop ANC members who are dedicated, selfless people with integrity. Yet twenty years later the ANC is consumed by corrupt cadres with the party clearly losing the battle against corruption and state capture.

How did this happen, and what exactly went wrong?

Political analyst Mpumelelo Mkhabela tells a fascinating story starting with Mandela, the Scorpions and Tony Yengeni all the way to Zuma and the Guptas to explain how we got here.

Worrier State looks at the pervasive culture of fear in South Africa. It reveals how narratives of fear manifest in contemporary media forms and the people they serve, and how these are impacted by race, class, gender, space and identity.

Through an interdisciplinary body of work, and using a case-based study approach, media analyst Nicky Falkof investigates how risk, anxiety and moral panic show up in media portrayals in modern South Africa. Her main intervention in this approach is through ‘affect’: how do South Africans feel about living under conditions of extreme fear, which is related to gross inequality, and how does the media make us feel? Together, these essays about ‘white genocide’, ‘Satanist’ murders, township urban legends and suburban community groups present an always-partial and necessarily contingent picture of some of the ways in which cultures of fear structure life and meaning for various people in various communities.

They show how narratives of fear underpin everyday life, informing both self-making and meaning-making in contemporary South Africa.

This book explores South Africa’s tumultuous history from the aftermath of the Second Anglo-Boer War to the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on never-before-published documentary evidence – including diaries, letters, eyewitness testimony and diplomatic reports – the book follows the South African people through the battles, elections, repression, resistance, strikes, massacres, economic crashes and health crises that have shaped the nation’s character.

Tracking South Africa’s path from colony to Union and from apartheid to democracy, History of South Africa documents the influence of key figures including Pixley Seme, Jan Smuts, Lilian Ngoyi, H.F. Verwoerd, Nelson Mandela, Steve Biko, P.W. Botha and Jacob Zuma. The book also gives detailed accounts of definitive events such as the 1922 Rand Revolt, the Defiance Campaign, Sharpeville, the Soweto uprising and the Marikana massacre. Looking beyond the country’s borders, it unpacks military conflicts such as the World Wars, the armed struggle and the Border War. The book explores the transition to democracy and traces the phases of ANC rule, from the Rainbow Nation to transformation to state capture. It examines the divisive and unifying role of sport, the ups and downs of the economy, and the impact of pandemics from the Spanish flu to AIDS and COVID-19.

As South Africa faces a crisis as severe as any in its history, the book shows that these challenges are neither unprecedented nor insurmountable, and that there are principles to be found in history that may lead us safely into the future.

South Africa’s democracy is often seen as a story of bright beginnings gone astray, a pattern said to be common to Africa. The negotiated settlement of 1994, it is claimed, ended racial domination and created the foundation for a prosperous democracy – but greedy politicians betrayed the promise of a new society.

In Prisoners Of The Past, Steven Friedman astutely argues that this misreads the nature of contemporary South Africa. Building on the work of the economic historian Douglass North and the political thinker Mahmood Mamdani, Friedman shows that South African democracy’s difficulties are legacies of the pre-1994 past. The settlement which ushered in majority rule left intact core features of the apartheid economy and society. The economy continues to exclude millions from its benefits, while racial hierarchies have proved stubborn: apartheid is discredited, but the values of the pre-1948 colonial era, the period of British colonisation, still dominate. Thus South Africa’s democracy supports free elections, civil liberties and the rule of law, but also continues past patterns of exclusion and domination.

Friedman reasons that this ‘path dependence’ is not, as is often claimed, the result of constitutional compromises in 1994 that left domination untouched. This bargain was flawed because it brought not too much compromise, but too little. Compromises extended political citizenship to all but there were no similar bargains on economic and cultural change. Using the work of the radical sociologist Harold Wolpe, Friedman shows that only negotiations on a new economy and society can free South Africans from the prison of the past.

"Warm, honest and true--A Woman Makes A Plan is full of insight as well as a good dose of humor, offering readers a lifetime of hard-won advice." --Diane Von Furstenberg The international supermodel shares personal stories and lessons learned from a life of "living dangerously--carefully"

Maye Musk is a fashionable, charming, jet-setting supermodel with a fascinating and tight-knit circle of family and friends--and is 71 years old. But things were not always so easy or glamorous--she became a single mom at 31, struggling through poverty to provide for her three children; dealt with weight issues as a plus-size model and overcame ageism in the modeling industry; and established a lifelong career as a respected dietitian, all the while starting over in eight different cities across three countries and two continents. But she made her way through it all with an indomitable spirit and a no-nonsense attitude to become a global success at what she calls the "prime of her life."

As everyone who follows her obsessively on social media knows, Maye is a fount of frank and practical advice on how the choices you make in every decade can pay off in surprising, exciting ways throughout your life. In A Woman Makes a Plan, Maye shares experiences from her life conveying hard-earned wisdom on career (the harder you work, the luckier you get), family (let the people you love go their own way), health (there is no magic pill), and adventure (make room for discovery, but always be ready for anything). You can't control all that happens in life, but you can have the life you want at any age. All you have to do is make a plan.

"My name is Samantha and I’m an alcoholic. At the time of writing, I’ve been sober for 13 years, 11 months and 16 days. And yes I still count. I promised I would never speak about it publicly until my children understood what that meant, that mommy was an alcoholic. I think they may have understood long before I did."

From Whiskey To Water is the no-holds-barred memoir by one of South Africa’s most loved radio talk show hosts, Sam Cowen. Having kept her alcohol addiction well away from the public eye for over 14 years, in this tell-all tale, Sam finds the courage to talk about her struggle with her addiction to whiskey, food and finally to a passion that saved her life – marathon swimming. Told in her characteristically hilarious dead-pan style, this is one of the bravest books you’ll read this year.

"So this is a book on how I stopped drinking? No, it’s not. It’s how I stopped drinking, started eating, became clinically severely obese, stopped eating (everything that wasn’t nailed down) and swam my way to freedom. No, it’s not. It’s actually about addiction and learning and sadness and anxiety and love and drive. It’s about channelling the unchangeable into the miraculous. It’s about dragons and learning how to put them to sleep when you can’t slay them. It’s about being my own Daenarys."

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB 2018 SELECTION

ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S BEST BOOKS OF 2018

‘Haunting...beautifully written.’ The New York Times Book Review

‘Compelling.’ The Washington Post

‘Epic...transcendent…triumphant.’ Elle

‘It’s among Tayari’s many gifts that she can touch us soul to soul with her words.’ Oprah Winfrey

‘Tayari Jones’ vision, strength, and truth-telling voice have found a new level of artistry and power.’ Michael Chabon, author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she struggles to hold on to the love that has been her centre. When his conviction is suddenly overturned, he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together.

This stirring love story is a profoundly insightful look into the hearts and minds of three people who are at once bound and separated by forces beyond their control. An American Marriage is a masterpiece of storytelling, an intimate look deep into the souls of people who must reckon with the past while moving forward – with hope and pain – into the future.

This riveting study shows how the intersection of technology and politics has shaped South African history since the 1960s.

It is impossible to understand South Africa’s energy crisis without knowing this history. Faeeza Ballim’s deeply researched book challenges many prevailing assumptions and beliefs made regarding the crisis.

The book highlights the importance of technology to our understanding of South African history and challenges the idea that the technological state corporations were proxies for the apartheid government. While a part of the broader national modernization project under apartheid, these corporations also set the stage for worker solidarity and trade union organization in the Waterberg and elsewhere in the country.

Faeeza Ballim argues that the state corporations, their technology, and their engineers enjoyed ambivalent relationships with the governments of their time. And in the democratic era, while Eskom has been caught up in the scourge of government corruption, it has retained a degree of organizational autonomy and offered a degree of resistance to those who were attempting further corrupt practices.

Every now and then a book comes along that is both timely and remarkable, that integrates all aspects of life; from recognising one’s roots, developing a moral grounding, building from strong family foundations to follow a chosen path to reach one’s goals, and remaining humble when it all comes to pass.

Time and Chance is an account, in a variety of contrasting images, voices and experiences gained from travelling the world in pursuit of business, where LAZARUS ZIM, industrious Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE) enthusiast, recounts his journey to become one of South Africa’s business leaders, with several firsts, while navigating the political minefield – disclosing descriptions of behind-the-scenes intrigue and conspiracy – and his interactions with Heads of State in South Africa and around the globe.

The recounting of Zim’s extraordinary rise to success oscillates between hope, faith, ethics, and diligence as he lays bare his successes and failures, and the organic wisdom, knowledge, and wit that have framed his business acumen and moral grounding.

It is a poignant reminder of a black child’s quest to fulfil his purpose in which the writer dares everyone to dream, even in the face of hopelessness.

Being Black In The World, one of N. Chabani Manganyi’s first publications, was written in 1973 at a time of global socio-political change and renewed resistance to the brutality of apartheid rule and the emergence of Black Consciousness in the mid-1960s.

Manganyi is one of South Africa’s most eminent intellectuals and an astute social and political observer. He has written widely on subjects relating to ethno-psychiatry, autobiography, black artists and race. In 2018 Manganyi’s memoir, Apartheid and the Making of a Black Psychologist was awarded the prestigious ASSAf (The Academy of Science of South Africa) Humanities Book Award. Publication of Being-Black-in-the-World was delayed until the young Manganyi had left the country to study at Yale University. His publishers feared that the apartheid censorship board and security forces would prohibit him from leaving the country, and perhaps even incarcerate him, for being a ‘radical revolutionary’. The book found a limited public circulation in South Africa due to this censorship and original copies were hard to come by.

This new edition is an invitation to a younger generation of citizens to engage with early decolonialising thought by an eminent South African intellectual. While the essays in this book are clearly situated in the material and social conditions of that time, they also have a timelessness that speaks to our contemporary concerns regarding black subjectivity, affectivity and corporeality, the persistence of a racial (and racist) order and the possibilities of a renewed de-colonial project. Each of these short essays can be read as self-contained reflections on what it meant to be black during the apartheid years. Manganyi is a master of understatement, and yet this does not stop him from making incisive political criticisms of black subjugation under apartheid. The essays will reward close study for anyone trying to make sense of black subjectivity and the persistence of white insensitivity to black suffering.

Ahead of its time, the ideas in this book are an exemplary demonstration of what a thoroughgoing and rigorous de-colonial critique should entail. The re-publication of this classic text is enriched by the inclusion of a foreword and annotation by respected scholars Garth Stevens and Grahame Hayes respectively, and an afterword by public intellectual Njabulo S. Ndebele.

So lyk ’n vrou, Ilse Verster se hartroerende verhaal oor Esli se lewe van mishandeling deur ’n gewelddadige eggenoot, het lesers in 2022 geskok en aangegryp. ’n Vrou staan op is die vervolg op die blitsverkoper en vertel van die nuwe hoofstuk in Esli se lewe.

Ná ’n uitmergelende egskeiding wat haar finansieel byna ruïneer, reis Esli Kaap toe om perspektief te kry op ’n lewe waar sy nie meer ’n slagoffer is nie. Dan gebeur daar ’n wonderwerk. Sy ontmoet iemand en hulle besluit om te trou. Uiteindelik is die geluk, vrede en veiligheid waarna sy haar lewe lank gehunker het, vir Esli beskore.

Máár haar stryd is nog lank nie verby nie. Post-traumatiese stres, ’n vreemde omgewing en nuwe verhoudings bring onverwagse uitdagings. Ook baie vrae, soos: Hoe kan ’n mens gelukkig wees, maar steeds huil? Die ongekende blootstelling wat tydens boekbekendstellings, praatjies en mediaonderhoude volg op die sukses van So lyk ’n vrou, maak dinge ook nie makliker nie. Esli kan haar nie volledig losmaak van die verlede nie, want almal stel moeilike vrae. Terselfdertyd moet sy ander slagoffers van narsisme moed inpraat.

In ’n Vrou staan op deel die skrywer haar ervarings van die moets en moenies in die proses na heelwording. Want om ’n oorwinnaar te wees, verg ook moed, deursettingsvermoë en ’n sekure instink vir oplossings wat wérk.

The Russians are invading. But the locals have a plan.

It's March 2022 and Russian tanks are roaring across the vast, snow-dusted fields of Ukraine. Their destination: Voznesensk, a town with a small bridge that could change the course of the war. The heavily-armed Russians are expecting an easy fight - or no fight at all. After all, Voznesensk is a quiet farming town, full of pensioners. But the locals appear to have other ideas.

Svetlana, a grandmother with arthritis, reacts in fury when Russian troops turn her cottage into their blood-soaked headquarters. Valentin, a quick-talking lawyer, joins the town's 'Dads Army' defenders, crouching in a trench with an AK47. Meanwhile, 21-year-old Sergei grabs a Molotov cocktail and lies in wait for Russian tanks as they push towards Dead Water Bridge.

The odds are terrible. But a plan is emerging, and there's a chance it could save not just Voznesensk, but the rest of southern Ukraine. Meanwhile, inside the tanks, an inner battle rages. As Russian officer Igor Rudenko prepares to invade, he has a secret. He is Ukrainian himself.

A gripping work of reportage that tells the story of a pivotal moment in Ukraine's war, this is a real-life thriller about ordinary people facing extraordinary circumstances with resilience, humour and ingenuity

The purpose of this handbook - Know your Rights, Claim your Rights - is to provide a straightforward overview of the Constitution of South Africa; to set out the basic constitutional rights and responsibilities of all South African citizens and to assist in drawing the attention of civil society to the remedies available when their rights have not been respected and upheld.

Are we in the middle of a generational war? Are Millennials really entitled 'snowflakes'? Are Baby Boomers stealing their children's futures? Are Generation X the saddest generation? Will Generation Z fix the climate crisis?

Revealing and informative, The Generation Divide provides a bold new framework for understanding the most divisive issues raging today: from culture wars to climate change and mental health to housing.

Including data from all over the globe, and with powerful implications for humanity's future, this big-thinking book will transform how you view the world.

Previously published as Generations.

Maria is a young woman raised as a Jehovah’s Witness in South Africa, and this book documents her experiences of gender victimisation, sexual abuse and cover-ups within the church, as well as her eventual ‘escape’ from its doctrines and control. Maria’s freedom came at a price, however – she can never see her mother and sister again.

A worldwide, Christian-based religious group that professes an unparalleled dedication to Jehovah (God), the Jehovah’s Witnesses have a strong sense of community and appear to embrace a disciplined yet loving way of life with the promise of eternal salvation for those who follow the way of Jehovah. It is a seemingly benign religious movement, claiming to be politically neutral, racially and ethnically transcendent, with a membership of eight million people worldwide. Yet, at its core, many former Witnesses claim that it is a fear-based doomsday cult that considers itself above all other belief systems.

Allegations of secular, cultish behaviour, homophobia, money laundering, brainwashing and countless accusations of institutionalised sexual abuse abound. It seems that membership is managed and retained mostly by way of information control and manipulation, extending to the shunning of higher education and preaching their own version of the Bible.

Entering the church is easy, but leaving it can be a matter of life or death, as Maria and countless others discovered...