A gratifyingly unsound psychological odyssey . . . Cartwright
destabilizes the novel's placid surface with aftershocks of
historical tragedies. - The New York Times Book Review Frank
McAllister has long since dropped Retief as his middle name, but
the legacy of his family's history proves harder to shake. His
ancestor Piet Retief, leader of the South African Great Trek, was
killed by Zulu king Dingane in the 1838 massacre, along with a
hundred men, women, and children. Afrikaner legend paints Retief as
a homegrown Moses, bringing his people to the Promised Land. But
Frank believes something rotten lies at the core of this family
myth. Frank spends his days in his London home with his new partner
and her son and the products of his wealth. But the return of his
daughter, Lucinda, from rehab in California brings him intense
guilt: having sided with him during his divorce from her mother,
she crumbled under the weight of the bitter separation. Lucinda has
brought home with her a mysterious boy, and they will join the
family trip to Frank's beach house in South Africa--not far from
the site of the 1838 massacre. In the lulls of their idyllic days,
Frank unravels what really happened on that fateful day, and how it
may connect to the violence of the apartheid years, and the
violence encroaching on them even now. Up Against the Night is an
enthralling tale of personal conflict and intrigue, set against the
backdrop of South Africa's tangled past and troubled present, and
told with tremendous color and insight. Absolutely original and
gripping, it is destined to be as influential as JM Coetzee's
Disgrace.
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Review This Product
A pleasant read
Sun, 12 Feb 2017 | Review
by: Marion York R.
About ex-pat, Frank (like Cartwright a descendant of Piet Retief) who is very wealthy and returns to South Africa, with his lover and wayward daughter, for a visit. His cousin, Jaco, residing in America, needs financial help to escape the Scientologists and calls on Frank.
Credible story, but I found Cartwright's depiction of Jaco's, and the local S.A. language, belaboured and irritating.
Cartwright is a great contemporary author but this, for me, is not his best book
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