BOOK MARKS
THIS collection of short stories has a marvellous South African flavour. De Lucchi spins an entertaining yarn, often surprising her reader with deliciously wicked endings. The 27 stories are bitesized and make for quick, indulgent bursts of reading.
From scorned women and mistreated children, to lonely spinsters and fed-up teens, De Lucchi’s stories are populated by interesting characters, most of whom get what’s coming to them, and a few for whom you can only hope the best.
A common thread which appears throughout is vengeance, with murder and abuse being recurring themes. Her women are mostly strongwilled – at times it’s commendable and others exasperating. What ultimately makes her stories so enjoyable is that she’s set them in very local settings.
– Terri Dunbar-Curran
Harper Element MEGAN Stephen’s heartbreaking six-year ordeal as a sex slave to inhuman traffickers at 14 years of age is not a comfortable read. Systematically she is robbed of her freedom or any money she “earns”.
Through this honest account of her life, I journeyed with her to Greece; saw the dingy hotels where she met disgusting clients who abused her.
I questioned whether I could bear to continue reading when her self- esteem hit rock bottom and she rendered her life useless.
Discovering she is saved was the only stimulus to turn the page, but I was forced to the abyss with her before her rescue. For victims of abuse, this is a painful journey.
For those unaffected, it is a worthwhile read to create awareness of the evils against innocent victims that go unpunished.
– Elaine Smith
ALL DAY AND A NIGHT
Harper Element A PSYCHOTHERAPIST is murdered in her office. The method used is the same as that employed by a notorious serial killer, Anthony Amaro.
The problem is, Amaro is already behind bars. And the DA’s office receives an anonymous tip-off that Amaro is innocent.
NYPD detectives Ellie Hatcher and JJ Rogan are ordered to reopen the Amaro case, which is 18 years old, and look for new suspects. And it soon transpires that there are plenty of surprises waiting to be unearthed.
Part police procedural, part legal thriller, this is an efficiently plotted piece of work, full of twists and turns, but the prose is boilerplate and the characterisation pretty basic.
Not my cup of tea; but fans of John Grisham or Jodi Picoult should enjoy it.
– The Independent
WHAT YOU WANT Constantine Phipps Quercus Publishing I MUST admit I groaned when I opened this and was confronted by lines of verse: “When I was about halfway through life/ (Always a cheery moment) I lost my wife/ To another man…”
A 309-page novel in rhyming pentameters? That’s sure to try one’s patience. Well, I was wrong, and ready to admit it by page 2. After his unhappy separation, having taken his son on a failed Disneyland trip, alone and drunk on whisky, Patrick is visited in a dream by Sigmund Freud, who takes him through a series of animatronic scenes, some from his own life, some where he meets historical figures such as Cleopatra and Pythagoras.
The goal to find out how to live. But I make it sound more formulaic than it is. It’s a real novel, with real characters, and it’s engrossing, moving and wise. Unreservedly recommended. – The Independent
Were you a teenager or young adult in the 1970s or were you born decades later and are wondering what growing up in South Africa was like for young white men during that decade?
This is a nostalgic and entertaining, yet also moving look at everyday life from a specific point of view – with all the adventures, heartaches, emotions, foolishness and confusion that it brought.
It recalls with humour and affection some of the author’s own experiences – from the difficulties of making longdistance telephone calls, social life before TV and national service, to falling in love and the unexpectedly meaningful conversations that shape your ideas about life and your understanding and misunderstandings about the society around you. It is as South African as braaivleis. – Lia Labuschagne MEET Simon, a high school student in Atlanta in the US. He is gay and is engaged with an e-mail correspondence with a boy called Blue. Trouble is Simon doesn’t know who Blue is. When he leaves his e-mail open on a computer in the school library, another boy reads it and starts to blackmail Simon.
Martin wants Simon to set him up with his friend Abby or he threatens him with exposure on Tumblr. It would be too easy to say this is a gay coming out novel. It’s wittily and engagingly written about the travails of being a teenager, and poses the very real question: if gay people have to come out, shouldn’t straight people have to too?
Above all a story about love, friendship, the slights that can wound our friends, it is highly readable and entertaining.
– Jennifer Crocker