Rule of Law - a memoir, by Glynnis Breytenbach with Nechama Brodie (Macmillan)
Glynnis Breytenbach was a formidable state prosecutor for more than 20 years but, in 2012, was suspended relating to her handling of a controversial mining rights case. Later she was acquitted on 15 charges, and is now an MP and the DA’s spokesperson on justice. In the words of co-author Nechama Brodie, Breytenbach is “a complicated, highly intelligent, deeply ethical and brilliantly sharp-tongued woman. Even her adversaries can’t help but grudgingly admire her”. Brodie says, in the editing, they had to remove many insults, and so we don’t know who Breytenbach was talking about when she described a legal colleague as having the intellect of a dead garden snail. In this memoir, she discusses the critical importance of an independent judiciary and the rule of law, and analyses some recent cases. (R209 at loot.co.za)
Dikeledi, a novel by Achmat Dangor (Picador Africa)
Dikeledi is a woman of the world, living in New York, teaching creative writing to college students. But, while her mother is American, her father is from Johannesburg, and he gave her the name she bears: Dikeledi, child of tears. She decides to write his story, and that of her grandmother and aunt, based on fragments her father left behind. She goes back through several generations of the family, discovering an apartheid-era crime syndicate and disillusioned freedom fighters, and is forced to confront questions of her own identity. Achmat Dangor’s Bitter Fruit was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2004. (R199 at loot.co.za)