Local books on our radar

Better put that crochet away. Stop trying to tidy your cupboards by following those how-to-fold T-shirt reels and stop fooling yourself that 2023 is the year you are going to gym. Because, by the looks of publishing lists, I’m not too sure there’ll be any spare time this year for anything besides reading. 

JANUARY

Dearest MaRiky: Journeying Through Grief and Healing by Louisa Zondo (Jacana)

Dealing with grief is different for everyone and is such a private undertaking but there’s solace in knowing what we are feeling is not uncommon. This book is a testament to that. In February 2022, Zondo’s world imploded when her son, musician Rikhado “Riky Rick” Makhado, took his life at the age of 34. She reflects on their relationship and struggles in a touching memoir of family life. Three weeks after Riky’s death, Zondo, an advocate and political activist, flies to Nepal to climb Mount Everest. As she does so, she looks back on Riky’s life and is forced to confront uncomfortable truths. She also experiences a strong spiritual sense of Riky’s presence which prompts her to begin writing letters in which she tells him the truth about her past for the first time.

Ghost Limb by Almini van der Merwe (Umuzi)

This is a debut novel from the Cape Town author, who joined the creative writing programme at UCT in 2009 where she was mentored by Stephen Watson. Her novel is set in the late 1980s in Strand, a small coastal town southwest of Cape Town. When Johanna, a new maid, arrives at the home of a dominee’s family, no-one imagines she will capture the family in her web of emotional complexity. But when a shift in South Africa precipitates a change in family life, Johanna is in danger of being left behind.

The Tears of the Weaver: Short Stories by Zaheera Jina Asvat (Modjaji)

The blurb says it best: “Asvat takes us into the private, individual worlds of a varied cast of characters and exposes the complicated weave of emotions so often concealed under the veneer of everyday lives. The stories provide a rethinking of conventions and roles, enabling readers to challenge the social phenomena within the world that religion and culture govern. These stories are earthy, feeling portraits of people struggling against an oppressive system within postapartheid South Africa.”

FEBRUARY

Mirage by David Ralph Viviers (Umuzi)

David Ralph Viviers is an exciting new literary talent. He was supervised by Damon Galgut — yes, the Booker Prize winner — while writing this novel. The blurb: “Out here, the past and the future lie over each other, like the strata of koppies. And in certain places the boundary between the two rubs clean. A century-old trunk has been dug up near the railway village of Sterfontein. Inside is the lost journal of Victorian author Elizabeth Tenant — and what appear to be the remains of a child. Michael, a university student recovering from a broken heart, is intrigued by what the journal describes: a scarlet curtain billowing above the desert, covering the entrance to another world. But things become even stranger when a line in the journal seems to be connected to Michael and his cosmologist mother, written a hundred years before their time.”

I Did Not Die by Tebello Mzamo (Kwela)

Much-loved author Sue Nyathi called I Did Not Die “a beautiful and pertinent story”. The debut novel by Tebello Mzamo is about Botho Pere who finds work as a miner in South Africa and has to leave his wife, Nthatisi, and their two children in Lesotho. Almost three years go by without news from Botho, and the resourceful Nthatisi is left taking care of their family. This haunting story explores the harsh realities of a mineworker's fragmented family.

Sons of Mud by Johan Vlok Louw (Umuzi)

Another sharp novel from the artist and author whose paintings and books probe the human psyche. Set at an “army base close to Voortrekkerhoogte in Pretoria, at the height of summer and the Border War, 18-year-old recruits endure an appalling drill sergeant bent on turning them into killing machines for the SADF. They are sleep-deprived, and tension mounts in this group of disparate individuals — boys from all walks of life — expected to function as a unit. Andrew Howard-Smythe, a surfer from Durban, is the first to notice the giant Afrikaans boy Reghardt Jurgens, whom he describes as a cross between a heavyweight wrestler and an orang-utan. After a particularly gruelling training session on a shooting range, it is Reghardt who snaps, severely injuring three officers before he is restrained. The investigation that follows is suspicious right from the start. It turns out that, instead of being prosecuted, Reghardt will be recruited for a sinister military outfit when his propensity for violence is recognised. This short, hard-hitting novel tracks the making of a henchman.”

Bloomer by Anne Schlebusch (Modjaji Books)

Award-winning author Fiona Snyckers writes about Bloomer: “As we celebrate the increasing diversity of voices in South African fiction, the elder voice is often overlooked. Bloomer is a refreshing antidote to that. Schlebusch’s Maggie is a delightful character with an internal life as full and rich as her external exploits. This book deals in second, third, and fourth chances at everything from family life to romantic love, to a career in the arts. I found it both inspiring and stimulating.”

MARCH

Milk the Beloved Country by Sihle Khumalo (Umuzi)

The inimitable travel author of best-seller Dark Continent My Black Arse reflects on the past and ponders the future of this captivating yet complex country. He delves into the history of the names given to our towns and cities, from Graaff-Reinet to Schweizer-Reneke, and raises issues we might not have interrogated fully. Entertaining, humorous and provocative.

Three Wise Monkeys by Charles van Onselen (Jonathan Ball Publishers)

Acclaimed historian Charles van Onselen is bringing out three volumes examining the complex relations between our country and Portugal’s chronically weak east coast colony, Mozambique, as expressed through the migrant labour system, the tourist trade, the rise and fall of LM Radio and the extraordinary tale of the Lourenco Marques Lottery. Three Wise Monkeys presents a striking new way of viewing the entangled, often hidden economic, political and social dynamics that informed the rise of 20th-century South Africa, often at the expense its neighbour.

A Little Light by Nthikeng Mohlele (Jacana)

The Discovery of Love, Nthikeng Mohlele’s debut short fiction collection published in 2021, set the scene to further explore the complexities and contradictions of human consciousness in this set of shorts. The blurb: “The intensity and range of the earlier stories is transplanted and further developed in A Little Light. From the dusty streets of Tembisa township of the 1980s to Osama bin Laden’s lair in Abbottabad, Pakistan, Mohlele is cerebral, playful, speculative, incisive and, most of all, of a penetrating narrative gaze.”

The Frightened by Lethokuhle Msimang (Karavan Press)

The blurb: “In this lyrical, fragmented novella, Lethokuhle Msimang uses autobiographical and poetic interventions to lead the reader through landscapes of loss and longing, travelling between France, China and South Africa to explore the troubled terrain of leaving and finding home. At once exhilarating, heartbreaking and haunting, The Frightened speaks to the complexity of relationships, the pain of love, the effects of trauma, the necessity and constant work of healing, and the unfulfillable wish to feel a true sense of belonging. It is the story of finding one's voice amidst inherited violence, and the importance of art and creativity in that process.”

Flipped by Tracey Hawthorne (Modjaji)

This is the author’s first novel. She has written non-fiction as well as variety of short stories that have been published in various journals. Crime buffs will no doubt want to read this story about two teenage girls who go missing without a trace. Six years later, another woman vanishes from home. Why and what connects them? If anything.

APRIL

Buried Treasure by Sven Axelrad (Umuzi)

Another debut novel which sounds delightful, with a good dose of the dark, strange and quirky. In a town called Vivo, where an old man named Mateus is the caretaker of the only cemetery. By his side is his faithful dog, interestingly called God. Mateus’s eyesight is failing, which is why he has been burying bodies in the wrong graves, and also why, while out walking with God, he trips over a young homeless woman. He decides to take on the woman, Novo, as his apprentice. She is determined to reorganise the cemetery, but she will have to hurry: buried all over the place, divorced from their names, the ghosts of Vivo are accumulating ...

Three Egg Dilemma by Morabo Morojele (Jacana Media)

Author Henrietta Rose-Innes writes: “An extremely intriguing manuscript. It is beautifully written: soulful, philosophical, heart wrenching, a vivid portrait of a hard world. Despite its length I found myself compelled. The touches of phantasmagorical horror, as well as the all too real horror of societal breakdown and the ravages of poverty, are vividly and immersively described. Mota’s ghost is a terrifying creation. Ex and Pearl are full, flawed, deep characters.” Set in Lesotho, this is a visionary novel with supernatural elements.

On the Wave of Gulls by Vernon RL Head (Jacana Media)

An exquisite, lyrical novel from best-selling author of The Search for the Rarest Bird in the World, Vernon Head. The architect and chair of BirdLife SA takes on a story that seems close to his heart. “Hieronymus Vos is an overweight, white architect who has fallen on hard times. He is married to a beautiful, black British-Caribbean woman. Although he hates the ocean, his practice has, until recently, been doing very well by designing glitzy, millionaires’ mansions on the Atlantic seaboard. Pooi is a homeless man, recently arrived from the Kalahari, with a patchy grip on reality. He thinks he is the moon and wants to teach himself to swim so that he can reach Robben Island and fulfil a promise. The third narrator is Calypso, a female seagull who needs to find a mate and lay an egg to pass on her legacy and her identity. By turns heartbreaking and thrilling, this unforgettable novel propels the author into the lives of the novel’s three main characters, throwing light on living and being in Cape Town.” 

Tunnel by Nick Mulgrew (Karavan Press)

If you have not read any of Nick Mulgrew's five other books, which include collections of poetry, short stories and a novel, then you are in for a treat with Tunnel. Actually, you have a few months to read his stuff before this, so get thee to a bookstore. Tunnel follows five adults and five children trapped underground in the Huguenot Tunnel due to an unidentified catastrophe. As the survivors’ supplies — including insulin for diabetic schoolteacher Mr B — run perilously short, how will they survive? This looks to be an intense exploration of the psychologies and coping strategies of humans pushed to their limits.

The Weight of Shade by Michael Boyd (Karavan Press)

Another fascinating debut. This one is set in the rural Marico District in North West. In this intertwined gothic tale there’s an orphan boy named Agni, a mysterious person called Kagiso, Nikus, a high-school boy, and his friend Marlene. They are all connected by Esmeralda, an old woman who never leaves her room.

MAY 

Each Mortal Thing by Michiel Heyns (Umuzi)

Michiel Heyns is one of the most sought-after Afrikaans-to-English translators so it’s amazing he has time to create his own world of words. Here he writes about Natasha, a novice writer from South Africa, who is nominated for a major British literary prize. She is taken in by Terence, a young university lecturer, who introduces her to London. However, the city and its literary cliques are a far cry from Natasha’s Karoo hometown. Due to another failing relationship after this, Terence is forced to reconsider the meaning of human connections. 

The Lion’s Historian: Africa’s Animal Pasts by Sandra Swart (Jacana Media)

Oh gosh, I’m just describing this book from its blurb. It sounds truly original: “The title for this fascinating, engrossing and eye-opening book comes from the proverb, ‘Until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter’.” Sandra Swart explores the histories, cultures and generational knowledge of animals in South Africa. Race, evolution and revolution, hunting, extinction, horses and resistance, horses and power, the 17th century Cape, police dogs and gold mines, are all there, laid over with Swart’s empathetic reimagining of animal life that has produced a groundbreaking book.

Other book to look out for this year:

Strangers of Braamfontein by Onyeka Nwelue (Blackbird Books) promises to be “gripping, fast-paced, no holds barred. This story about life on the streets of Braamfontein is uncompromising in its depiction of the drugs, sex and gang rivalry that often threaten to consume all of those involved.”

Dreamer: The Activation of Makebo by Tanya Junghans (Blackbird Books) is the first experimentational fantastical first novel in a series of two. Here there are different realms, a tortured, dreamwalking protagonist and a species that watches over the Milky Way. 

Also, worthy of mention is that Penguin Ramdom House SA is bringing out a new Eben Venter book in English and Afrikaans in June, superstar novelist Lauren Beukes apparently has a new one coming out in September, and the anthology Short.Sharp.Stories has been resurrected with this year's exciting one, Fluid, coming out in March. Yay!