BrightLights@BookBuddy

Time travel in Brazil. A book and two photographic exhibitions reveal in black and white the complexity that is this enigmatic tropical country.  Salvador de Bahia, the unique bay of Rio de Janeiro, endless beaches, faces, forests, buildings, vistas of the city: Brazil is a reservoir of overwhelming beauty that has stimulated photographers' lenses for almost two centuries - from Pierre Verger and Marcel Gautherot, to contemporar y photographers such as Salgado and now, Kristin Capp, an American living in Namibia, the author of a recent monograph dedicated to the country of the 2016 Olympic Games.  'An indelible imprint on my mind,' thus Capp described the impression Brazil had made upon her senses in her book, Brasil . Here an absorbing world of unexpected and surprising sights which took eight years to research and photograph , reveal s a complex country , beyond the stereotypes of carnival-football-beach , as photographed in b lack and white,...

I’ve heard it said that the oppressed make the worst oppressors.    I never ever thought the day would come when I thought of myself as an oppressor, and yet, here we are.    Ten years. That’s how long it took to season what may have been my greatest love.    I didn’t fall in love with him… I grew in love with him, which I think is a dangerous kind of way to love, because it’s a love that is near-impossible to uproot. He liked me. And, while I enjoyed the attention of him liking me, I was too busy growing in love with him to truly like him back. I loved him; he didn’t love me back. He liked me in that way that boys sometimes like girls: for their pretty faces and the way they smile. He didn’t have the time to grow in love with my soul like I was trying to grow in love with his. I loved him, I eventually learned to be happy just loving him, and I badly wanted him to love me, too. I convinced myself that if only I jus...

Competition No. 03/2016 Two (2) lucky readers stand the chance to win a copy each of THE KUPFERBERG MINING COMPANY (postage free for Namibia).   To enter this competition, simply e-mail the answer to the question below, to bookbuddynamibia@gmail.com by Friday, 21 October, 2016 before 13:00. Remember to provide your full name and contact particulars in your mail. Competition Question: Who wrote the 'The Kupferberg Mining Company'?  (name and surname, please) Excerpt from The Kupferberg Mining Company: Some members of government have their own agenda when they request private access to a restricted area in the Namib desert for military exercises.  A community, known by government insiders under the name of the Kupferberg Mining Company only, have existed in secret until now.  While on an excursion to Pelican Bay, Rudolf de Wet notices armed men in the distance. He finds murdered tourists and shots are fired in his direction. The questions are e...

J ohan Beyers, family man, grandfather and a children's toy-maker who permanently resides in eastern Namibia, hardly fits the mould of the typical fantasy fiction author. This is after all, the genre of J. R. R. Tolkien, Roald Dahl, Terry Pratchett, Stephen King and most recently, J. K. Rowling, to name but a few. Born in South Africa in 1953, Beyers qualified as a meteorological technician at Pretoria Technicon, and moved with his wife to Namibia in 1977 where they have quietly lived ever since, until a few years ago. H is debut novel, The Kupferberg Mining Company , published by Wordweaver Publishing House in 2013, is something out of the ordinary, and read in countries as far away from Namibia as Finland. The German noun adjunct 'kupferberg' literally translates into 'copper mountain'. The novel is classified by us as fantasy fiction, a genre which allows for the existence of imaginary worlds where surreal, supernatural, paranormal and magic events, even magic...

 Image: Lauri Kubuitsile for Books Live, Sunday Times “I love our inconsistencies and our internal conflicts,” says Lauri Kubuitsile. “The convoluted ways we bend our thoughts to rationalise our actions, to justify what we do, even the most horrible acts. We’re not always good; if we were I would have long left human stories and started writing about warthogs or baobab trees. Some of the scenes made me sad. Sometimes reading them, even now, I cry. But that’s okay, I’m human too; we are a magnificently resilient sort of animal.”  In an interview with Jacqui L'Ange for the Sunday Times

Synopsis South-West Africa, 1904: When German colonial authorities issue an extermination order, the Herero are forced to flee into the Kalahari desert and seek safety in British Bechuanaland (modern day Botswana). Tjipuka, a young Herero mother, escapes the genocide with her infant, but is captured and put to work in the death camps in Luderitz. There, she has to find the courage, and the will, to survive against all odds. The Transvaal, 1899: Riette's nursing ambitions are crushed w hen she is forced into marriage with an older neighbour. When he is taken captive by the British colonial regime and their farm set ablaze during the Second Anglo-Boer War, she and his daughters endure the horrors of the British concentration camps. Against the backdrop of southern Africa's colonial wars at the dawn of the twentieth century, THE SCATTERING traces the fates of two remarkable women whose paths cross after each has suffered the devastation and dislocation of war. ...

Iron Hand by Andre Izaaks  (Mariental, Namibia) Disgruntled, dismayed in hopeless despair Surefooted the mob makes its way. Disowned by the masters who now run the town The struggle kids have something to say. Destination; a bacon-strip of red, black and blue The party some say you can trust The demonstrators beg to differ somehow 'Said they've been treated unjust. Suddenly they're there; Batons, clubs, the boys in blue There to keep the order An old instruction, nothing new.  The kids though are restless Fed-up with the status quo The Force draws live ammo Suddenly all gung-ho.  Pandemonium ensues Both sides at full blast Going at each other Onlookers stand aghast.  Amidst the chaos and mayhem A casualty, someone said, Behold, when the dust had settled One of the struggling lay dead.  A commission of inquiry Walters is tasked to probe The police shrugged shoulders Been playing rope-a-dope.  The verdict is s...