Africa English

Before the U.S. embarks on a dangerous political journey, it should consider the lessons—both positive and negative—of South Africa's experience. This book draws on President Donald Trump's infamous alleged quip about "sh!thole countries." Though he denied making the profane comment, it is a useful shorthand for what neither the U.S. nor South Africa would wish to become, but which "transformation" could condemn them to be.

In Residual Governance, Gabrielle Hecht dives into the wastes of gold and uranium mining in South Africa to explore how communities, experts, and artists fight for infrastructural and environmental justice. Hecht outlines how mining in South Africa is a prime example of what she theorizes as residual governance—the governance of waste and discard, governance that is purposefully inefficient, and governance that treats people and places as waste and wastelands.

Julie Harris stars in this one-woman play by William Luce based on the life and writings of Isak Dinesen, author of Out of Africa.

South Africa - 1976 to 1994. A time of turbulence as the struggle against apartheid reaches its zenith, pushing South Africa to the brink. But for a one small boy in the leafy northern suburbs of Johannesburg...his beloved housekeeper is serving fish fingers for lunch. This is the tale of Hamish Charles Sutherland Fraser - chorister, horse rider, schoolboy actor and in his dreams, first XV rugby star and young ladies’ delight. A boy who loves climbing trees in the spring and a girl named Reggie. An odd child growing up in a conflicted, scary, beautiful society.

Secrets haunt Adam Broadford’s extraordinary life. The ugly divisions of race, religion, and politics in the early '60s and '70s Africa gnaws at him. Beauty and brutality are constantly at odds. Happiness and sadness are locked in a dance. And so much is his fault. But against a richly depicted backdrop with deeply resonating characters, there are gifts, wisdom, and murder.

At just ten years old, Julie leaves her close-knit loving family in the city for a country boarding school in Swaziland to join her brother, Seth. Julie's adventures offer an insight into life at a harsh, food-rationed religious boarding school of the fifties. This school, set in glorious African countryside, includes all the sports, horse-riding, piano lessons, performing arts, and high level of education that are possible to prepare a child for entrance to a British university

The Liberian Civil Wars examines the incredibly deadly conflicts in the West African region, and how they changed the nation. You will learn about the the wars and Liberia's transition like never before....

At a time when the world waits anxiously to see what will happen next in Zimbabwe - when there is little food in the country's shops, life expectancy is plunging and Zimbabweans are fleeing repression and unemployment - this book gets to grips with the man at the helm of a corrupt regime; the man behind the monster. Holland's tireless investigation begins with her having dinner with Mugabe the freedom fighter and ends in a searching interview with Zimbabwe's president in December 2007, more than 30 years later.

At a fort in Cabo Vermelho in 1779, Sisi, a West African girl with a gift for languages, works as a translator for her English enslavers. She was separated from her younger brother after they were kidnapped from their village by the ahosi, fierce female warriors who serve a neighboring king—and her guilt over her failure to protect him has never left her. When unexpected news reaches the fort, Sisi must find her voice, for her brother’s sake and for her own.

Three Empires on the Nile tells of the rise of the first modern Islamic state and its fateful encounter with the British Empire of Queen Victoria. Ever since the self-proclaimed Islamic messiah known as the Mahdi gathered an army in the Sudan and besieged and captured Khartoum under its British overlord Charles Gordon, the dream of a new caliphate has haunted modern Islamists. The 19th-century origins of it all were even more dramatic and strange than today's headlines.

In Blood on Her Hands, award-winning journalist Tanya Farber investigates the lives, minds and motivations of some of South Africa’s most notorious female murderers, from the poisonous nurse Daisy de Melker, to the privileged but deeply disturbed Najwa Petersen, to the mysterious Joey Haarhoff, who died before revealing the fate of her victims. Written in a style lighter than the subject matter might suggest, Blood on Her Hands will keep you listening until late at night.

Precious Ramotswe gets a very special treat. She gets a trip to visit her Aunty Bee at a safari camp. On her first day in camp, a new lion arrives. But this is no average lion: Teddy is an actor-lion who came with a film crew. When Teddy escapes, Precious and her resourceful new friend Khumo decide to use their detective skills to help track him. They will brave the wilds of the bush - and its hippos and crocodiles - as they try to find where Teddy has gone.

When young queer dancer Wilbess “Bessy” Mulenga is arrested by corrupt police, fresh-from-the-village rookie lawyer Grace Zulu takes up his cause in her first pro bono case. Presented with a freshly beaten client, Grace protests to the police and gets barred from accessing Bessy, who then disappears from the system—and the world—without a trace. As she fights for justice for Bessy, Grace must navigate a dangerous world of corrupt politicians, traditional beliefs, and deep-seated homophobia.

Poverty and depravity wreak havoc on Hassan Omar’s family. Amid great hardship he decides to escape. The arrival of independence brings new upheavals as well as the betrayal of the promise of freedom. The new government, fearful of an exodus of its most able men, discourages young people from travelling abroad and refuses to release examination results. Deprived of a scholarship, Hassan travels to Nairobi to stay with a wealthy uncle, in the hope that he will release his mother’s rightful share of the family inheritance.

Back to the Bush is the tale of a second year at Sasekile Private Game Reserve for brothers Angus and Hugh MacNaughton. Angus’s weekly journal recounts a positive beginning to the year: fastidious Hugh is in love, running his own camp and on the verge of a promotion. Angus is involved in a romantic liaison, which takes the edge off his customary cynicism, and for the first time in their adult lives, a positive fraternal bond exists between them.

Southern Mozambique, 1894. Sergeant Germano de Melo is posted to the village of Nkokolani to oversee the Portuguese conquest of territory claimed by Ngungunyane, the last of the leaders of the state of Gaza, the second-largest empire led by an African. Ngungunyane has raised an army to resist colonial rule and with his warriors is slowly approaching the border village. Desperate for help, Germano enlists Imani, a 15-year-old girl, to act as his interpreter. She belongs to the VaChopi tribe, one of the few who dared side with the Portuguese.

This timely book offers a world history of insurgencies and of counterinsurgency warfare. Jeremy Black moves beyond the conventional Western-centric narrative, reaching back to antiquity to trace the pre-modern origins of war within states. His sweeping study will be essential material for all students of military history.

Fifteen-year-old Amadou counts the things that matter. For two years what has mattered are the number of cacao pods he and his younger brother, Seydou, can chop down in a day. This number is very important. The higher the number, the safer they are, because the bosses won't beat them. The higher the number, the closer they are to paying off their debt and returning home to Moke and Auntie. Maybe. The problem is, Amadou doesn't know how much he and Seydou owe, and the bosses won't tell him.

Kwasi Kwarteng is the child of parents whose lives were shaped as subjects of the British Empire, first in their native Ghana, then as British immigrants. He brings a unique perspective and impeccable academic credentials to a narrative history of the British Empire, one that avoids sweeping judgmental condemnation and instead sees the Empire for what it was: a series of local fiefdoms administered in varying degrees of competence or brutality by a cast of characters as outsized and eccentric as anything conjured by Gilbert and Sullivan.

Arrah has sacrificed almost everything in her battle against the Demon King. Now, forced to give up the gift of magic she’d sought for so long, she must decipher the legacy of her past life as the orisha Dimma—and weave an uneasy alliance between her beloved Rudjek, the Demon King, and the remaining orishas, hoping to restore peace to all of their worlds. But as Arrah’s half-demon sister resumes her quest for destruction, peace may require the ultimate sacrifice.…