Well-known author and journalist, Hilary Prendini Toffoli, has just launched her third and final book in the Pistola series, Pistola: The Vendetta (MYEBOOK). Pistola started out his working life as a teenage steward on 1950’s SA trains when SA’s then Minister of Transport, launched a recruitment drive in Italy. Thousands responded and 110 young Italian men worked on our trains, something I remember well as my family often traveled on them from Botswana to Cape Town.
Back to fiction… Pistola, who was imprisoned in apartheid SA under the Immorality Act, returns from Italy to SA to help a friend, and lands in trouble again. His grandfather Nonno Mario, based convincingly, on Hilary’s Italian husband Emilio, is furious. The energy, hilarity and drama will keep you reading deep into the night.
An extraordinary book, The Rift: Scar of Africa (HPH Publishing) by Shem Compion is the finest and most hauntingly exquisite book on Africa I have yet seen. Compion, a self-taught photographer, is today revered by international photographers, the BBC, is a member of the Royal Geographic Society and has published seven books.
The Rift is not to be taken lightly – it weighs several kilograms – and Compion writes that one day an ocean will lie where the Rift is today, dividing Africa into two distinct portions.
Wild animals, colourful tribes and astounding landscape photographs ensure that this book will endure for future generations – such is its impact. An environmental treasure and an investment for years to come.
Peter Hain, an anti-apartheid activist, whose family was exiled from SA, and who became a UK Labour government MP, has in his 27th book, Liberation and Corruption: Why Freedom Movements Fail (Jonathan Ball) written compellingly about the struggles that liberation movements have in staying true to their original values and ethos.
They are often riven by corruption and power struggles, and Hain examines global examples ranging from Africa to Russia, Latin America, China and India. I found his chapter, ‘Lessons from Africa’ informative and riveting.
Reading Matters with Sue Grant-Marshall
