SOUTH AFRICA AUTHOR · FICTION · GENERAL
Gillian Slovo
Out here on deck my breath is turned to ice but I won't go in, at least not yet.
— from The Ice Road, 2004
Most acclaimed
The betrayal
There is an alternate story of the life of Jesus. One the early Church fathers found so menacing they outlawed the books that documented it, ordered them burned, and threatened anyone found copying them with death. International bestselling authors and award-winning archaeologists Kathleen O'Neal Gear and W. Michael Gear put more than thirty years of exhaustive research into this fascinating novel. In A.D. 325, Brother Barnabas is a student of the ancient holy texts. These books paint a portrait of Jesus that is radical, heretical, and irresistible. In the writings of Mary Magdalene, Phillip, and James, Barnabas finds clues to a secret he must protect at all costs. But the Ecumenical Council of Bishops has just declared his cherished books "a hotbed of manifold perversity." Emperor Constantine has decreed that the documents must be burned and that anyone found copying them will be executed as a heretic. Barnabas's monastery is attacked. Brother Barnabas flees with his trusted companions, but they are being followed, for the True Church cannot allow them to find the most sacred place on Earth. In fact, it will do anything to stop them...
Red dust
"In a small, dusty, South African town, three people, returning after many years away, are about to meet their past. Successful prosecutor Sarah Barcant leaves New York to help Ben, her mentor and inspiration, with one last case. Dirk Hendricks is being driven, handcuffed, to the police station in Smitsrivier where he was previously a deputy, there to meet his former prisoner, the man he tortured, Alex Mpondo.". "These three are drawn by the Truth Commission like a magnet back into their pasts, setting the stage for the moment of collision. But the real truth will be felt in the wings: in the fatal strain in a marriage, in the violated memory of a sweet son, and in a victim's understanding of his own complicity."--BOOK JACKET.
The Ice Road
2004
"Irina Davydovna, survivor of the ice ship Chelyuskin, which sank in the Arctic circle, is back in her beloved home city of Leningrad. She thinks her troubles are over. But this is Leningrad in 1933. As Stalin begins to turn against the city, and his old favourite Sergei Kirov, Irina finds herself caught up in forces beyond anyone's control." "Loyalties, belief, love and family ties: all are about to be tested to the limit in one of the most devastating moments of human history." "There is Boris Aleksandrovich, who, having persuaded Irina Davydovna to go on the ice ship, feels honour bound to find her a new position within his family circle. Boris thinks he can negotiate between idealism and politics, yet his daughter, Natasha, a carefree girl, will be almost crushed by his compromises. Meanwhile, his oldest friend, Anton Antonovich, in an uncharacteristic moment, rescues a young orphan he finds on a Moscow train, only to discover that her ferocity for life will eventually threaten his own." "And watching all this unfold is Irina: wise, ironic, marvellous Irina, who comes to understand how love for another may, in the end, be more powerful and more profound than blind loyalty to an idea."--BOOK JACKET.