Product Description

Marnus is terrified he will not fulfil the expectations of his elite Afrikaner family who are certain of their superiority. But when Mr Smith arrives, things start to change, affecting Marnus's values and everything around him that he he holds dear. Mark Behr's debut novel and the recipient of numerous awards including South Africa's biggest literary prize, the M-Net Award, as well as the Eugene Maris Prize and the CAN Literary Award. In the UK the book was shortlisted for the Steinbeck Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize, and received the Betty Trask Award. In the USA the novel won the Art Seidenbaum Award from the Los Angeles Times.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1298323 in Books
• Published on: 1996-04-04
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 7.80" h x .59" w x 5.04" l, .34 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 200 pages

From Amazon.com
It's not that Marnus Erasmus is forced to parrot his major-general father's prejudices--the 11-year-old has no idea he's even doing so. The voice Mark Behr has created is a mix of youthful innocence and hope and terrible hatred and ignorance. Unconsciously relaying tales of Communist indoctrination and Coloured abomination, the boy is all set to become another soldier of the white South African state. "Dad says he'll never forget what the Communists and the blacks did to Tanganyika. And Dad says we shouldn't ever forget. A Volk that forgets its history is like a man without a memory. That man is useless." Marnus's domestic memories, however, turn out to be far more difficult to deal with than any issues of national import. His final essay of the school year ends with the triumphant "Open eyes are the gateways to an open mind," even as his family is attempting to keep his firmly shut.

From Publishers Weekly
"The dreams of the parents become the dreams of the children," observes Marnus Erasmus, the 10-year-old son of an affluent white South African family of the early 1970s. The irony behind his remark lies at the heart of this moving and tragic first novel, whose innocent narrator provides the perfect lens through which to view a culture in decay and self-denial. A boy who enjoys fishing and playing with his grade-school friends, Marnus lives in a beautiful house with his mother, a former musician, and his father, the youngest-ever major-general in the South African Defence Force. But doubts, many mirroring the unpleasant realities of South Africa itself, begin to burrow at the foundation of this seemingly idyllic life. The young son of the family's servant is severely burned by white men; Marnus's beloved aunt is exiled from the family for espousing "liberal" views, while his sister, Ilse, threatens to follow in her footsteps; a visit from a Chilean general inadvertently reveals to Marnus the moral rot within his own parents' marriage. Perfectly controlled and powerfully realistic, this novel is underwritten in the most positive sense: Behr creates a situation so potent that the characters seem to indict themselves. And yet the reader retains sympathy for Marnus, a boy just beginning to understand the horror around him and, in italicized passages seeded throughout the narrative, a man facing death 15 years later on the battlefields of Angola.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Set in South Africa during the 1970s, this alarming debut novel relates the story of an Afrikaner family through the eyes of the narrator, Marnus Erasmus. Marnus is a product of the Afrikaner culture and apartheid system. Against a background of commonly accepted racial prejudice, he lives a seemingly happy life, governed by his father, who is a general in the South African military. As the novel develops, Marnus witnesses the slow disintegration of his family, including the sexual molestation of his best friend by his father and an affair between his mother and a visiting general. The story is rich with striking metaphors that present the oppression and hypocrisy of the system, and the author displays the narrative style and insight of a skilled storyteller. The subtle development of Marnus's family exposes the ruthless reality of South Africa under apartheid. A book that promises to create strong reactions; recommended for most collections.
-?David A. Berona, Westbrook Coll. Lib., Portland, Me.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.