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Jean Gill from Provence, France wrote:
Book recommendations - If you like history, passion & politics, try 'The Zebra Affaire' by Mark Fine and 'Lenin's Harem' by William Burton McCormick
Genre: literary historical thriller
THE ZEBRA AFFAIRE - My Review
While beautiful Afrikaner Elsa was committing the crime of love for a black Malawi man working in South Africa, in 1976, I was much the same age and living in the UK, horrified by the idea of Apartheid but knowing little of the inside story. Thanks to this wide-ranging novel, I’ve experienced that inside story: a personal history of individuals from the three major 'human categories' recognized by the ‘uncivil servants’, and also the history of a country through a political revolution.
The central love affair is beautifully told, sensual and moving as the lovers fight the system, aided by courageous friends. I wanted Elsa and Stanwell to be together. The bead necklace moved me to tears. It was a terrible moment for me when the couple were offered the chance to go to England – and turned it down. That’s when I understood that there are two love affairs in this book; like Stanwell, Mark Fine loves South Africa; its peoples, its landscape and its wildlife. He knows that the cute lion cubs who leave spittle in Elsa’s hair are the same creatures who rip apart their prey in the bush – and he still loves them.
Passionate and honest, Mark Fine has chosen to set the context documentary-style, in italics, and tells the reader to skip those parts if they so wish. I thought I’d find this fact-fiction structure irritating but I didn’t. For me, it’s part of what makes this ambitious novel so powerful: an intelligent, compassionate analysis of terrible events gave me an understanding of how daily life in South Africa was constrained in every way, how segregation meant a degree of censorship that created a different kind of segregation. White South African were also cut off from ‘the rest of the world.’
The first half of the book stopped me in my tracks a few times to re-read some wise words about life and there is beautiful writing, with local colour from the Africaans phrases included. Then the pace went up several gears and I was turning pages to find out what would happen. I felt the shift in pace was a little awkward, as if there were two different kinds of books – both equally good, but likely to appeal to different readers and expectations. The final chapter returned to the more contemplative overview of the individuals in the wider political context and I felt these parts of the book to be important, worth re-reading, far more than an exciting plot.
Mark Fine is not afraid to judge the politicians and the politics of the era, in black and white (!) His period details are impeccable and I enjoyed the digressions into characters’ family histories. It made me smile when I read the words ‘So, back to the story.’ This enthusiasm for the breadth of story he has to tell is part of the book’s charm, as he says of ‘the manner of Africa… with the warmth of humanity’s voice’.
LENIN'S HAREM - My Review
Who is the real enemy? 20th Century Eastern Europe, an eye-opener
Totally brilliant. A serious historical epic from the viewpoint of Wiktor Rooks, born into the landowning German upper class in Latvia, trying his best to do what is right and forced into impossible choices. One of the moments in the book that tore me apart was when Wiktor’s lover Kaiva, her face smashed by Russian soldiers, asks him, ‘Why didn’t you fight?’ And yet, throughout the book, he has tried so hard to fight, in all kinds of ways, and he never gives up.
The second half of the book gripped me completely on a personal level because I was drawn into the relationship between Communist Kaiva and sceptical Wiktor. The dinner party in which Wiktor’s aristocratic parents meet his fiancée is gut-wrenching black comedy.
In the first half of the book I felt I was living events in WW1 Latvia (and Russia) and that continued with the introduction of Kaiva, through revolution, then war again. I knew nothing of the politics but followed every vile turn, from the deliberate deployment of Latvian troops on suicide missions to the regular announcements that ‘the government has been replaced’. The details of mustard gas attacks brought home the horrors of war, with neither sensationalism nor heroics. It felt so real!
I am left with the same feelings as when I read ‘Doctor Zhivago’; totally caught up in the attempt of one man to live and love ‘normally’ within a context where war is a useful method for ‘settling accounts’ and disguising genocide.
Genre: literary historical thriller
THE ZEBRA AFFAIRE - My Review
While beautiful Afrikaner Elsa was committing the crime of love for a black Malawi man working in South Africa, in 1976, I was much the same age and living in the UK, horrified by the idea of Apartheid but knowing little of the inside story. Thanks to this wide-ranging novel, I’ve experienced that inside story: a personal history of individuals from the three major 'human categories' recognized by the ‘uncivil servants’, and also the history of a country through a political revolution.
The central love affair is beautifully told, sensual and moving as the lovers fight the system, aided by courageous friends. I wanted Elsa and Stanwell to be together. The bead necklace moved me to tears. It was a terrible moment for me when the couple were offered the chance to go to England – and turned it down. That’s when I understood that there are two love affairs in this book; like Stanwell, Mark Fine loves South Africa; its peoples, its landscape and its wildlife. He knows that the cute lion cubs who leave spittle in Elsa’s hair are the same creatures who rip apart their prey in the bush – and he still loves them.
Passionate and honest, Mark Fine has chosen to set the context documentary-style, in italics, and tells the reader to skip those parts if they so wish. I thought I’d find this fact-fiction structure irritating but I didn’t. For me, it’s part of what makes this ambitious novel so powerful: an intelligent, compassionate analysis of terrible events gave me an understanding of how daily life in South Africa was constrained in every way, how segregation meant a degree of censorship that created a different kind of segregation. White South African were also cut off from ‘the rest of the world.’
The first half of the book stopped me in my tracks a few times to re-read some wise words about life and there is beautiful writing, with local colour from the Africaans phrases included. Then the pace went up several gears and I was turning pages to find out what would happen. I felt the shift in pace was a little awkward, as if there were two different kinds of books – both equally good, but likely to appeal to different readers and expectations. The final chapter returned to the more contemplative overview of the individuals in the wider political context and I felt these parts of the book to be important, worth re-reading, far more than an exciting plot.
Mark Fine is not afraid to judge the politicians and the politics of the era, in black and white (!) His period details are impeccable and I enjoyed the digressions into characters’ family histories. It made me smile when I read the words ‘So, back to the story.’ This enthusiasm for the breadth of story he has to tell is part of the book’s charm, as he says of ‘the manner of Africa… with the warmth of humanity’s voice’.
LENIN'S HAREM - My Review
Who is the real enemy? 20th Century Eastern Europe, an eye-opener
Totally brilliant. A serious historical epic from the viewpoint of Wiktor Rooks, born into the landowning German upper class in Latvia, trying his best to do what is right and forced into impossible choices. One of the moments in the book that tore me apart was when Wiktor’s lover Kaiva, her face smashed by Russian soldiers, asks him, ‘Why didn’t you fight?’ And yet, throughout the book, he has tried so hard to fight, in all kinds of ways, and he never gives up.
The second half of the book gripped me completely on a personal level because I was drawn into the relationship between Communist Kaiva and sceptical Wiktor. The dinner party in which Wiktor’s aristocratic parents meet his fiancée is gut-wrenching black comedy.
In the first half of the book I felt I was living events in WW1 Latvia (and Russia) and that continued with the introduction of Kaiva, through revolution, then war again. I knew nothing of the politics but followed every vile turn, from the deliberate deployment of Latvian troops on suicide missions to the regular announcements that ‘the government has been replaced’. The details of mustard gas attacks brought home the horrors of war, with neither sensationalism nor heroics. It felt so real!
I am left with the same feelings as when I read ‘Doctor Zhivago’; totally caught up in the attempt of one man to live and love ‘normally’ within a context where war is a useful method for ‘settling accounts’ and disguising genocide.
