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.
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