General

Cecil John Rhodes’s Plan for a new World Order by Robin Brown (Penguin Books) ISBN 9781770229204 You can tear a statue down but you cannot expunge the history that caused the statue to be built in the first place. Tall, intelligent, nineteen-year-old Cecil John Rhodes was sent from England to South Africa after being diagnosed with […]

by Manda Scott (Bantam Press) ISBN: 9780593072486 Manda Scott attempts to link a modern-day mystery to an age-old tale of tragic heroism. Captain Ines Picaut delves into an investigation of several arson attacks in Orleans, but finds herself tangled up in secrets that rival the threat behind the flames. Her story is paralleled with that

by Richard Dawkins (Bantam Press) ISBN 9780593072561 This autobiography focuses on Dawkins’ 35 years as an academic. The subtitle is “My life in science”, which brushes on Dawkin’s childhood in Zimbabwe and moves swiftly along to Oxford and Berkley Universities. While there are some interesting anecdotes about famous and learned people he has met along his professional journey, such as Francis

by Lucy Cruickshanks (Heron) ISBN 978-1-84866-531-6 Lucy Cruickshanks writes about the truly exotic Rubyland, Myanmar and the Burmese civil war in the 1980s. An 11-year-old girl named Thuza Win watches her ruby-smuggling parents being tortured and taken captive. As Thuza Win tries to save her parents from the Shan State Army, a soldier takes her grandmother’s dagger and slashes her

Innovation: Shaping South Africa Through Science by Sarah Wild (Pan Macmillan)

by James-Brent Styan (Jonathan Ball), ISBN: 978-1-86842-696-6 Load shedding has dominated headlines so readers may believe that a book does not provide any new information about a topic that is public knowledge. Styan’s book offers a comprehensive view of the problem. As a journalist who covered this story since 2008, he has the credentials to

by Kobus Galloway (Zebra Press) ISBN: 9781770228849 Kobus Galloway is an artist with a passion for comedy.  He puts both these skills to work in this illustrated localised ‘Where’s Wally’ allowing the reader to laugh through the tears looking for Zuma on every page. Zuma can be found at the arms deal expo, at Sun City

by David Baldacci (MacMillan) ISBN No: 9781447277811 David Baldacci is one of my favourite authors, and he delivers another fast-paced read in the latest Will Robie thriller, The Guilty. My heart fell when I read Baldacci’s letter prefacing the book, in which he writes that he wants to show that Robie is not infallible, and that

by Peter James (Macmillan) ISBN 9781447290674 They said the dead can’t hurt you…they were wrong. I was fascinated with this story from the beginning, where a ghostly old lady dressed in blue with a hideous smile, walks through walls. Ollie and Caro and daughter Jade are thrilled with their new castle like home.  There is a drip

by Alexander McCall Smith (Edmont) ISBN 9781405265348 This is a delightful combination of three books: Akimbo and the Elephants, Akimbo and the Lions and Akimbo and the Crocodile Man. They are suitable for children and adults alike. Anyone who loves nature will enjoy these stories. In the first book, Akimbo and the Elephants, Akimbo is a