Saving Safa
Waris Dirie (Little, Brown)
***
Book buff
This is the tale of how Waris Dirie, founder of the Desert Flower Foundation, which campaigns for an end to female genital mutilation (FGM), works with her team to save Safa. The story begins when Dirie receives a heart-wrenching letter detailing how Safa is afraid that her parents will get her cut. The book does a great job of putting a face and voice to victims of FGM, although it does little to dispel Western-held views of Africa. It’s clear that the book was written as part of a fundraising campaign for the foundation, and written primarily for a white western audience.
- Noluthando Ncube @BeautysDaughter
Everyday Matters: Selected Letters of Dora Taylor, Bessie Head and Lilian Ngoyi
M J Daymond (Jacana)
****
Book Buff
Offers insight into how three women dealt with the mundane issues of life alongside their exceptional circumstances of being exiled or alienated. Union organiser and writer Dora Taylor corresponds with her daughter; acclaimed novelist Bessie Head communicates with a fellow-novelist in England; ANC leader Lilian Ngoyi writes to a friend and benefactor. Head’s correspondence, especially, courageously explores her spats with authority. Each woman strives to focus on something beyond herself; for, as Head warns, “Never think along lines of I and mine. It is death.”
- Ayesha Kajee @ayeshakajee
Black Rabbit Hall
Eve Chase (Penguin Random House)
****
Book fling
Author Eve Chase deftly weaves past and present together in this impressive debut. Lorna and her fiancé Jon are scouting for potential wedding venues when they come across Pencraw Hall in Cornwall, known affectionately to the locals as Black Rabbit Hall. Lorna dimly remembers visiting it as a child but can’t explain her strong emotional attachment to it. Their story is interwoven with events that happened decades before, when Amber Alton and her family experienced love, heartbreak, romantic awakening and unspeakable tragedy.
- Fiona Snyckers @FionaSnyckers
The Girl in the Spider’s Web
David Lagercrantz (MacLehose Press)
****
Book thrill
There’s nothing really amiss in this new Millennium Series book. Just like Stieg Larrson, Lagercrantz introduces plot threads and characters a-plenty in the first half, and, once you get through, it’s a helluva page-turner. The protagonists stay true to Larsson’s pen: die-hard journo Mikael Blomkvist remains the anchor figure, with everything circling back to what punk superhacker Lisbeth Salander does. Blomkvist is looking for a big story to break to save his magazine and he finds one when computer genius Frans Balder learns his life’s in danger. Enter Salander.
- Jennifer Platt @Jenniferdplatt
Book details
- Saving Safa: Rescuing A Little Girl From FGM by Waris Dirie
EAN: 9780349005966
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- Everyday Matters edited by Margaret Daymond
Book homepage
EAN: 9781431409488
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- Black Rabbit Hall by Eve Chase
EAN: 9780718182977
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- The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David Lagercrantz
EAN: 9780857053503
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