Sunday Times Magazine F/C 50-51 - 10/05/2017 04:17:18 PM - Plate:

PAGE 50 MAY 14 2017 MAY 14 2017 PAGE 51

{ BOOKS }

book bites elites in the US and around the world.

Instead of pursuing a new, libertarian option,
however, voters find populism more
Book Buff appealing. He writes: “We should be learning
You Too Can Have a the value of individual dignity, individual
Body Like Mine freedom, and individual responsibility from
★★★★★ the failure of the elites and the fiasco of
Alexandra Kleeman their vast political power. Good things are
(HarperCollins, R285) made by free individuals in free association
Alexandra Kleeman’s debut with other individuals. Notice that’s how we
After months of evaluation and deliberation it is finally time to reveal the shortlists for South Africa’s novel is an uncomfortable make babies.” He continues: “But we aren’t
learning lessons in individual freedom,
most prestigious book awards, the Alan Paton Award for non-fiction and the Barry Ronge Fiction read. Her exploration and
because we’re too scared. We’re daunted at
critique of modern-day
Prize, in association with Porcupine Ridge. The winners, who will each receive R100 000, will be society’s obsession with consumerism is the pace of material change, unnerved over
social configurations, fretful about economic
unerring. Within the first few pages
announced on Saturday June 24. Kleeman, via the narrator, comments on the instability, and terrified by terrorism.” Yes,
warped contemporary ideals of female the elites have messed up around the world,
beauty; the dangerous allure of advertising; O’Rourke says, but the answer is not
populism and a narrowing of individual

The Sunday Times Literary Awards Finalists and our innate need and insatiable desire to
consume. It’s told in the first person
narrative, simply by someone known as “A”
who lives with “B”. They are 20-something
liberty and responsibility. And certainly not
Trump. — Patrick Bulger

women living in small-town America who are

basically your girls next door. But “A” Book Thrill
becomes part of a cult and their lives begin A Gentleman in Moscow
to unravel. You Too Can Have a Body Like ★★★★★
Mine is unsettling as it hits so close to home. Amor Towles
The characters in the novel are people you (Penguin Viking, R295)
know, people you’ve met, you. Kleeman has This is a splendid tale of a
written an existential, accessible novel man making the most of the
reminiscent of Requiem For a Dream and cards life has dealt him. The
Fight Club which will make you think twice story begins in the 1920s,
before buying into any trend of any sort. — when a Bolshevik tribunal finds Count
Mila de Villiers @mila_se_kind Alexander Rostov guilty of being an
aristocrat. His punishment: permanent house
arrest in the attic of the luxurious Hotel
Book Real Metropol. Here the count embarks on the
How the Hell Did This biggest adventure of his life. It’s as much a
Happen? The Election tale of unlikely friendships and magnificent
of 2016 ★★★★★ encounters as it is a fictionalised, wry
PJ O’Rourke (Penguin account of Russian history. Towles is guilty of
Random House, R290) a well-wrought plot and vivid three-
Veteran journalist/humorist dimensional characters: the precocious nine-
PJ O’Rourke’s latest work, year-old, the volatile chef, the omniscient
on the US election, asks concierge, the nimble maître d’ and the
the question in its title. conniving bishop make A Gentleman in
Unfortunately, much of the first part of the Moscow a stylish, charming novel that
book is unfunny, college-style humour that informs and delights. — Anna Stroud
will fail to find traction among readers @annawriter_
outside the US. But he later gets into his
stride, commenting on the two candidates:
“Yet to call Hillary robotic is an insult to Book Buff
androids. She’s more like someone trapped The Golden Son
inside a Hillary costume, one of those ★★★★★
dressed-up characters pestering tourists in Shilpi Somaya Gowda
Times Square.” As for Trump: “Trump was (HarperCollins, R270)
the guy from the mailroom who somehow Anil and Leena grow up
wound up with a job interview for the together in the same
position of national sales manager. If you Indian village. But the lives
promote him it will be a disaster. But if you of the two friends diverge:
leave him in the mailroom he’ll take his pants Anil finds himself in the US
down, sit on the Xerox machine, and fax the training to become a doctor, while Leena is
result to all your customers.” The closing married to a man she doesn’t know and is
THE BARRY RONGE FICTION PRIZE exclaimed a judge, “it brings people from THE ALAN PATON AWARD (Penguin Books) chapters of the book offer an insight into the brought to an unfamiliar village. The reality
our past gorgeously to life.” It is 1903. A The judging panel was united in its admiration populist wave sweeping world politics, not of their lives is at odds with their dreams:
In the five shortlisted books, the judges frail Malangana searches for his beloved The shortlist reflects a diverse range of subjects of Greg Marinovich’s account of the Marikana least here in South Africa where “radical encountering racism, sexism, domestic
highlighted writing of rare style and Mthwakazi, the woman he had loved 20 and historical eras: from human origins to the massacre. Drawing on his own investigations, economic transformation” has become a violence, the culture of privilege and
imagination, stories that chose the years earlier and who he was forced to Marikana of just three years ago, from Cape witness accounts and the findings of the catch-all slogan and supposed popular inequality. The Golden Son is a coming-to-
personal over the political, and themes leave. Based on true events in history, it Town today to wartime Berlin. “These books Marikana commission of inquiry, he remedy for our economic problems. Being a America tale, illustrating the cost of
that are fresh and provocative. “The is a poignant story of how love and raise critical questions about our past, present reconstructs that fateful day and the events libertarian and believer in small government, travelling to new places: “He was a dweller
words”, says chairwoman Rehana perseverance can transcend exile and and future,” says chairwoman Pippa Green. “The leading up to it. It is damning, gripping O’Rourke cogently expresses his of two lands, accepted by none.”
Rossouw, “strike at the reader’s heart”. strife. big question being asked is, who are we?” reportage, the best book by far, said the disappointment with the revolt against ruling — Tiah Beautement @ms_tiahmarie
judges, on this diabolical event.
The Printmaker, The Woman Next Door, Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard: Life
Bronwyn Law-Viljoen (Umuzi) Yewande Omotoso Among the Stowaways, Sean Christie My Own Liberator, Dikgang Moseneke
Law-Viljoen’s quiet, finely calibrated (Chatto & Windus/PRH) (Jonathan Ball Publishers) (Picador Africa)
novel is set in Johannesburg and centres In this story of two strong-willed This is the fascinating account of journalist Sean The autobiography of South Africa’s retired
on a reclusive printmaker named March, women, Omotoso delicately traces the Christie’s time spent among the Tanzanian deputy chief justice of the Constitutional Court Books LIVE most viewed remaining wives, a
who makes his art obsessively — and racial fault lines of the rainbow land. One stowaways who live rough under the Nelson is an impressive book, explaining how skinny dog, a rapidly
alone — for decades. When he dies, a of the women is black, the other white, Mandela Boulevard flyover in Cape Town. The Moseneke’s life was shaped. He recounts the In the irreverent tradition of her best- dwindling entourage,
friend inherits the thousands of drawings and for decades the pair live next door judges commented on his “brilliant eye” and history of his forebears and pays homage to selling Death by Carbs, Paige Nick rounds and a fire pool to
and etchings crammed into the house to each other in an affluent estate in sympathetic treatment of this subculture. “He’s the many communities that played a role in his up a fresh herd of sacred cows in another maintain. Plus the
and through his work sets out to Cape Town. One day, an accident brings something of an anti-hero, not the usual macho development. “He is a great figure,” said one hilarious local satire. But this time it’s No 1 municipality is
understand her troubled friend. “There’s them together. “She doesn’t pretend to observer. It is heartbreaking.” judge, “this is a very moving story.” who gets the treatment . . . demanding he pay a
not a superfluous word in it,” said one have the answers,” commented one It’s 2020, and ex-president Jeremiah vast outstanding
judge. “March is still living in my head.” judge, “but she forces us to examine our Darwin’s Hunch: Science, Race, and the Letters of Stone: From Nazi Germany to Gejeyishwebisa Muza has just been rates bill.
deeply embedded racism. It’s very clever Search for Human Origins, Christa Kuljian South Africa, Steven Robins (Penguin released from prison on medical parole,
Period Pain, Kopano Matlwa and deeply human.” (Jacana Media) Books) with a dangerously infected ingrown
(Jacana Media) Christa Kuljian of the University of the In this gutting, deeply personal book, toenail. Now he’s back home with his two ý Read more at www.bookslive.co.za
The wunderkind author shows she has a The Safest Place You Know, Witwatersrand studied the history of science at sociologist Steven Robins chronicles his search
long career ahead with this acute, Mark Winkler (Umuzi) Harvard and has turned her eye to the search for the members of his family who died in
powerful book. Masechaba is a young After his father’s violent death one day for human origins in South Africa, and the Germany during the war. His father had fled
woman trying to find meaning in in the drought-stricken Free State, a contemporary context that sullied it. She the Nazis and found shelter in Port Elizabeth, LINK LOVE: Cult Novels
contemporary South Africa, a country young man leaves the derelict family examines how ideas about race blighted science but never spoke a word about the family he Flavorwire says it’s not easy to describe
racked by social problems. “Where are farm with no plan. Two people he meets for centuries, setting up stereotypes that survive left there. When Robins stumbles upon a what a cult novel is: “You sort of know
we going,” it asks, “and what have we on his way to the Cape will change his today. “This is the best science and sociology hidden collection of letters he is able to “hear” one when you read one.” Here are 50
become?” “It’s a searing, brilliant read,” life forever. The story is set in the ’80s, book I’ve read in a long time,” said one judge. “It those people for the first time. “What is also examples of what they deem notable cult
said a judge. before everything changes. “I was blown should be taught in high schools.” fascinating is that Robins writes of the Basters books — from the popular On The Road
away by the magnificent writing,” said a in Namibia and the eugenic experiments on by Jack Kerouac to the more obscure
Little Suns, Zakes Mda (Umuzi) judge, “the story went straight to my Murder at Small Koppie: The Real Story of indigenous people there which was the starting I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith. Find
“Zakes Mda is on song with this book,” heart.” the Marikana Massacre, Greg Marinovich point for Nazi horrors.” them at http://bit.ly/50cultnovels