Lessons from business and two gardens

Patricia McCracken’s selection this week includes lessons from a tech start-up, a polemic on South Africa’s Evangelical churches, and a guide to Cape Town’s majestic Kirstenbosch Gardens.

The First Kudu by Ben Shaw & Lorne Hallendorff (TMP, R330)

Reading a business book that is set out of your sector means you don’t identify with the scenario and events, so assess more dispassionately learnings from how the founders handled developments, for good or ill. HouseME, a South African tech start-up that aimed to be the Uber of renting and letting flats, is vividly depicted as a Gen Z team surfing its rollercoaster of success, hazards, awards and COVID, the ultimate challenge because nobody could move during lockdown. Both authors are steeped in management studies and talk freely about their strategising, attempts to raise the funds that would ultimately give them liftoff, and handling the stresses and strains of rapid expansion. They acknowledge they were lucky to have recruited supportive and often technically creative staff, aren’t shy of admitting some of their most memorable mistakes and underline this with a final section of thematic learnings.

Power and Faith: How Evangelical Churches are Quietly Shaping our Democracy by Pontsho Pilane (Tafelberg, R280)

Pilane is a journalist turned media and communication specialist with academic leanings and her book has the feel of the modern undergraduate seminar debate. She doesn’t mince her words, saying Christianity reinforced colonial superiority and became the mouthpiece for the ruling class. Not a rebel without a cause, but someone rebelling against a cause.

Using her own life and narrating a traumatic religious encounter with “a white-led, multiracial megachurch” that she calls The Family, she attempts “to decide my truth”. Ultimately, in her view, the institution we call the church – and in particular the evangelical and Pentecostal churches – is not a place of protection and refuge; these churches threaten our lives as they collaborate with and morph into institutions of oppression. You’ll love this book or hate it.

Kirstenbosch: A Visitor’s Guide by Colin PatersonJones & John Winter, revised by Alice Notten (Struik Nature, R150)

Many may have the glorious National Botanical Garden at Kirstenbosch on their list as an exciting place to visit. This beautifully published 32-page, A4 glossy book doubles both as a guide and a glorious souvenir to prompt memories. It was first published two decades ago and this this third edition has been revised by Alice Notten, chief information officer at Kirstenbosch, and the person who sees to it that the information boards are up to date and enthralling. She’s also a keen, self-taught photographer and several of her photographs have been featured, including a remarkable one of a caracal strolling down a garden path. A double-page map helps you find where you are in relation to the various attractions or the points to link into routes to walk, climb or mountain bike beyond. Well devised to help you get the most out of your day at Kirstenbosch.

Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah (Pan, R260)

Meredith and Nina Whitson have always felt there’s something remote about their mother, Anya. In turn, the sisters have grown apart, with Meredith being the capable one running the family business and Nina the creative one who travels the world as a photojournalist. They adore their father and when he faces dire illness, they must find a better way to support their mother than her own choice – sitting outside in the freezing cold in her nightgown contemplating her winter garden. Meredith and Nina know little of their mother’s Russian past and to find a solution to this family crisis, they must work through an emotive Russian folk tale, haunting memories of the grim 1941 siege of Leningrad, and eventually tie up past and present in ways that none of them had guessed. Hannah’s vivid settings and strong characterisation make this recently republished book memorable.