South African Literature

Set in Soweto, the urban heartbeat of South Africa, Innards tells the intimate stories of everyday Black folks processing the savagery of apartheid with grit, wit, and their own distinctive bewildering humor. Rich with the thrilling textures of township language and life, it braids the voices and perspectives of an indelible cast of characters into a breathtaking collection flush with forgiveness, rage, ugliness, and beauty.

Fleeing her moribund marriage in Cape Town, Beth accepts a diplomatic posting to Shanghai. In this anonymous city, she hopes to lose herself in books, wine, and solitude, and to dodge whatever pangs of conscience she feels for her fealty to a South African regime that, by the 21st century, has betrayed its early promises.

Rowan Quinn knows fatherhood is a role he doesn’t want to take on—until he unexpectedly finds himself a single dad. He uproots his perfectly constructed life to move to a tight-knit coastal community in South Africa where, with the help of his grandmother, Rowan has a shot at giving his son the family he never had.

One last chance. Almost fired for insubordination, Detectives Benny Griessel and Vaughn Cupido find themselves demoted, exiled from the elite Hawks unit and dispatched to the leafy streets of Stellenbosch. Working a missing persons report on student Callie de Bruin is not the level of work they are used to, but it's all they get. And soon, it takes a dangerous, deeply disturbing turn.

Told through the lives and spirits of four generations of amaTolo women, including The Old, who speak wisdom with ever-increasing urgency, it moves between the bustling township setting of Kwanele and the different rhythms of rural village life.

In Academic Libraries: A Journey with Panyim and Nyakor, readers are invited to witness the transformative power of education as seen through the eyes of two young lovers from South Sudan. Panyim, an aspiring engineer burdened by academic challenges, finds an unwavering source of support in Nyakor, whose expertise in academia is only matched by her dedication to Panyim’s success. Set against the backdrop of the University of Juba, this narrative takes you through the hallowed corridors of academic libraries, both physical and virtual, showcasing the vital role they play in a student’s ...

Daniel is a worldly and urbane journalist living in London. His relationships appear to be sexually fulfilling but sentimentally meager. A young gay man with no relationships outside of sexual ones, he can seem at once callow and, at times, cold to the point of cruel with his lovers. Emotionally distant from his elderly, senile father, Daniel nonetheless returns to South Africa to care for him during his final months. Following his father’s death, Daniel learns of an unusual clause in the old man’s will.

The year is 1902, and the world is changing with the new century. Twenty-one-year-old Ava Stanley, the daughter of two celebrated Arcane Taxonomists, has much to live up to—however scarce her magical abilities may be. While her parents draw power from spectacular birds and megafauna, Ava’s connection to the natural world is much smaller, stemming from the microscopic. This is useful in her quest to become a doctor, as she studies the burgeoning links between bacteria and disease, but it means Ava’s power itself is also smaller.

In turn-of-the-century South Africa, 14-year-old Lettie, her younger brother, and her mother are Dutch Afrikaner settlers who have been taken from their farm by British soldiers and are being held in a concentration camp. It is early in the Boer War, and Lettie's father, grandfather, and brother are off fighting the British as thousands of Afrikaner women and children are detained. Determined to dictate their own fate, Lettie and her family give each other strength and hope as they fight to survive amid increasingly dire conditions.

A poacher vanishes into thin air, defying logic and baffling ace tracker Mia Greenaway. Meanwhile Captain Sannie van Rensburg, still reeling from a personal tragedy, is investigating the disappearance of two young girls who locals fear have been abducted for use in sinister traditional medicine practices. But poachers are also employing witchcraft, paying healers for potions they believe will make them invisible and bulletproof.

Since the night Atlanta mayor, self-made millionaire, and womanizer Jamison Jackson plummeted from the top floor of a downtown hotel, everyone seems to have profited, from vicious criminals to corrupt politicians. Everyone except his jilted first wife Kerry. Once a socialite, she's now the prime suspect in Jamison's alleged murder. But she swears she's no killer - and surprisingly, Jamison's widow Val agrees. For all they know, it was Coreen, the mother of Jamison's secret love child.

**Some things are worth the wait.** Set on Canada’s picturesque Cape Breton Island, this book is perfect for those who enjoy new beginnings and countryside landscapes. Sam MacAuley and his wife Annalize are total opposites. When Sam wants to leave city life in Halifax to get a plot of land on Cape Breton Island, where he grew up, his wife wants nothing to do with his plans and opts to move herself and their three boys back to her home country of South Africa. As Sam settles into a new life on his own, his friend Lachlan encourages him to get back into the dating scene. Although he meets ...

Captain David Grief, South Pacific tycoon, owns plantations and trading stations from New Guinea to Samoa, pearling fisheries in the Paumotus, and rubber acreages in the Louisiades. His own vessels recruit contract labor, and he operates three steamers on ocean runs. He came to the South Seas at the age of 20 and, blessed with a blond skin impervious to tropical rays, became browner through two decades as a true "son of the sun". At 40 years of age, he looks no more than 30.

A family emergency brings former rapper and current real estate mogul Ivan Spencer back to his long-abandoned hometown. While there, he must deal with his confused mother, his elderly, philandering father, his flaky sister, an unreliable aunt, and a face from the past who makes him question some of his earlier decisions. All he wants to do is to get things squared away and return to his life, but as it turns out, he must deal with his own issues first.

Captain Sannie van Rensburg and safari guide Mia Greenaway are caught in the crossfires of a decades-old feud between five veterans of South Africa's apartheid-era Border War. Haunted by the deadly mission that shaped their lives forever, the ex-paratroopers must finally confront their demons, and each other, at the funeral of a comrade in the red dunes of the Kalahari Desert. But their scars run deep, and as the truth emerges, each man must ask himself: When serving your country, what makes you a hero and what secrets are worth dying for?

Reverend Sabre Winfrey, Jr., shepherd of the Seven Seals Missionary Baptist Church, believes in God, his own privilege, and enterprise. He owns the barbershop and the radio station, and generally keeps an iron hand on every aspect of society in Dominion, Mississippi. He and his wife, Priscilla, have five boys; the youngest, Emanuel, is called Wonderboy—no one sings prettier, runs as fast, or turns as many heads. But Wonderboy, his father, and all the structures in place that keep them on top are not as righteous as they seem to be.

Linda, Dikeledi, Nolwazi and Sade spent their twenties pursuing fast-paced careers and love lives in vibrant Johannesburg. Now, with their thirties just around the corner, they know the one thing they can count on is each other, but it turns out even the firmest friendships have secrets… On the cusp of their thirtieth birthdays, just when everything should be going to plan, their lives start to derail.

Since childhood, Jen and Kemi have lived like sisters in the McFadden family home in Edinburgh, brought together by a shared family history which stretches back generations. Kemi was educated in Britain alongside Jen, and the girls could not be closer, nor could they be more different in the paths they take in life. But the ties that bind them are strong and complicated, and a dark family secret exists in their joint history.

In cosmopolitan Johannesburg, three high-flying couples form the core of the elite Khula Society: part investment group, part social club, with meetings where the champagne flows, the dresses are designer and the one-upmanship is off the scale. Noma, Moshidi, Lerato and their husbands are living the dream—or so it appears from the outside. In reality, the cut and thrust of ‘keeping up with the Khulas’ is taking its toll on all three couples.

Evil is stalking South Africa’s Sabi Sand Game Reserve. Viewers around the world are shocked when a live lockdown webcast of a safari game drive exposes them to the brutal reality of rhino poaching. A wily poacher disappears into thin air, confounding logic and baffling ace trackers Mia Greenaway and Bongani Ngobeni. Detective Colonel Sannie van Rensburg, still reeling from a personal tragedy, is dealing with an angry community on the border of the Kruger National Park - two young girls have been abducted.