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Second sex unveiled
This frank look at how sexuality, sexual behaviours, relationship skills develop in a man, makes <i>Bad Sex</i> a groundbreaking novel.
Jane Rosenthal
Building character
<b>Jane Rosenthal</b> on how the women portrayed in local fiction are a reflection of their changing status.
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Jiving inside the box
<i>The West Rand Jive Cats Boxing Club</i> is written with verve, but is suffers from uneven editing.
Home away from home
Works by Chinese-South African authors give
insight into the immigrant experience.
How best to serve porridge
Finuala Dowling’s third novel, <i>Homemaking for the Down-at-Heart,</i> explores familiar territory but is as poignant as ever.
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In search of lost ground
The short review of this book is simply this: it’s remarkable, and you should not only read it but buy a copy as you will want to look into it again.
Stories of our wars and peace
A bonding of fiction and history creates a tangible reminder of the fraught decade before Mandela’s release.
Old soldiers’ friend
Jenny Hobbs paints a sympathetic portrait of the often ignored men who fought the battles that bought us our freedom.
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At last a sequel that stands perfectly on its own
This novel, <em>At Last</em>, is a sequel to St Aubyn’s previous four novels on the Melrose family, but can be appreciated by itself.
Serote’s dialogue of disparates
Many years of mulling over ideas about post-1994 South Africa has resulted in a skillfully considered novel that’s not an easy read.
Deeper than reality
This dark novel leaves you unconvinced, angry and asking all the ‘wrong’ questions.
A merry dance
In book circles, it’s important to choose carefully the partner with whom you do-si-do.
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Love in the time of transformation
This cheerful but realistic novel examines the right of young people to make personal choices that are different from those of their parents.
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Best of the summer words
Jane Rosenthal recommends books to while away the long, lazy, reading-friendly days that beckon.
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Dark heart of man
Jayne Galassi, in this new novel, describes perfectly the sudden transition from one reality to another, before and after the drowning of a child.
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Light and dark in mixture of memoir and novel
<em>Sunnyside Sal</em> is an apt title for this book, especially for those who know that Sunnyside is the Hillbrow of Tshwane.
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Surely, humour and kindess triumph again
Chris van Wyk has followed his first memoir, <em>Shirley, Goodness and Mercy</em>, with a second volume, <em>Eggs to Lay, Chickens to Hatch</em>.
Driving without steering
<em>Parrot and Olivier in America</em> is a reflection on the restlessness of post-revolutionary societies, writes <em>Jane Rosenthal</em>.
A slave’s life of strife and redemption
Andrea Levy’s <em>The Long Song</em> is not for the fainthearted, but is filled with anger, strength and beauty.
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The Last Summer
<em>The Last Summer</em> is a very pleasing novel; for all its apparent artlessness, it remains in the mind long after one has put it down.
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30 Nagte in Amsterdam
Etienne van Heerden needs no introduction; as a novelist he is honoured both at home and internationally.
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Black Petals
Macaulay Vogel, presumably of Scottish and Dutch descent, is the dull-as-ditchwater protagonist of this sadly tedious novel.
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Facts and fictions
Jane Rosenthal looks back at a year of lives captured — or not — on the page in a series of autobiographies.
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When living isn’t easy
JM Coetzee latest ‘novel’ presents a portrait of a vulnerable man who recognises his inability to establish close relationships.
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For the thrill of it
Crime is central to South African life, and to its genre fiction. Three local thrillers had Jane Rosenthal riffling and reflecting.
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A delightful collection of oddities and asides
Reif Larsen’s first novel is an impressive piece of work that deserves a special place on your bookshelf.
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Bildungsroman out of Africa
Jane Rosenthal finds liberation, hope and thoughtfulness in three accounts of traumatic childhoods.
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Making contact
Jane Rosenthal discovers a rich interpretation of the human touch in a South African anthology of short fiction.
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Of shadows seeing shadows
Jane Rosenthal explores the complexity of the everyday in Imraan Coovadia’s third novel <em>High low in-between</em>.
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Words of honour
As the winter solstice approaches and we tilt into the deepest part of winter, it seems the right time to hibernate with good books.
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Scar tissue of apartheid
Jane Rosenthal reviews <i>The Lahnee’s Pleasure </i> by Ronnie Govender and <i>An African Cameo</i> by Naka Pillman.
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Satirical sympathies
Jane Riosenthal reviews The Keep and Remembering Herman Charles Bosman — Herman Charles Recollected .
