Fiction: The Distance by Ivan Vladislavic and three other titles
By Cameron Woodhead
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Writer Joe Blahavic and his brother Branko, a film editor, collaborate on a memoir. The project takes inspiration from the meticulous scrapbooks Joe kept about his childhood hero, Muhammad Ali. His obsession was largely literary, given television was introduced to South Africa only in 1976, and the scrapbooks prompt memories and textures of a vanished world, piercing the psychology of a white family living in apartheid South Africa in the 1970s. Who cares about that?
Branko himself wonders: “I’m starting to worry about Joe’s book. He should have finished it himself, long ago, when white people were still interesting.” Yet with contemporary South Africa as the frame, the way Joe and his brother struggle to compose the work forms an integral layer of the narrative.
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What a year. Who would have thought this time last year that 2020 would bring a pandemic? And what did it mean for books? Well, publishing schedules went a bit haywire as titles were postponed, trumpeted or slipped under the radar. It was possibly the worst time to be a debut author, with launches taking on a new identity.
Writers festivals and bookshop events were cancelled or migrated online. But didn t we readers respond well? We took to virtual events in our homes with alacrity, while festival directors swiftly and imaginatively adapted their offerings in a new world.