Lost Ground

by Michiel Heyns

Award-winning author Michiel Heyns returns with another richly textured novel, set in contemporary South Africa. The murder of Desirée, a beautiful woman, shatters the peace of Alfredville, a small rural village, and her husband, the police station commander, is arrested as the chief suspect. Her cousin Peter, a freelance writer in London, returns to South Africa for the first time in decades - unsettled, curious, but also in search of a career-defining story. He soon finds that things are not as straightforward as he imagined, and that South Africa is not as it was when he left it. He meets a mixture of locals, visitors, vagrants and migrants, and also discovers that his once close school friend, Bennie Nienaber, is still living in Alfredville and is now the acting station commander at the local police station. They re-establish an awkward friendship, sharing reminiscences that hint at a bond deeper than nostalgia. As Peter abandons his intended story and finds himself drawn into the community that he once despised, he begins to reconsider his place in the world. In search of the truth about Desiree's story, he now starts to rewrite his own, until events take an even more shocking turn … Michiel Heyns is the author of four previous The Children's Day, The Reluctant Passenger, The Typewriter's Tale and Bodies Politic. He is an acclaimed translator and was professor of English at the University of Stellenbosch.

Genres: Fiction, Africa, South Africa, Literary Fiction

345 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 1, 2011

About the author

Michiel Heyns is a South African novelist, translator and literary critic. Until 2003, he was Professor of English Literature at the University of Stellenbosch when the success of his first novel allowed him to become a full-time writer. As an academic he is best known for his work on 19th and 20th century literature, especially his acclaimed study, Expulsion and the Nineteenth-Century Novel: The Scapegoat in English Realist Fiction (Oxford University Press, 1994).

In 2002 he made his debut as a novelist with the comic coming-of-age story, The Children's Day. This was followed by another novel of high comedy, The Reluctant Passenger (2003) which has since been translated into French. His subsequent novels have moved away from the South African milieu: The Typewriter's Tale (2005), which focuses on Theodora Bosanquet, the amanuensis of Henry James, was followed by Bodies Politic (2008), which deals with the English suffrage movement of the turn of the 20th century.

He is also the award-winning translator of Tom Dreyer and Marlene van Niekerk (most famously of her The Way of the Women), and continues to write widely as a literary critic and reviewer.

Reviews

[Margitte · Rating 5 out of 5]

This tale is so complex, so diverse, so rich, and so ironic in scope that I know I will fall flat on my face if I try to dissect it.

Beginning with a murder mystery, which it is in all aspects and foremost, it is also a tale of redemption, of searching for identity, of trying to make sense of life, regret, prejudice, and the aftermath of choices. What makes us as humans go back to our roots when it can only spell out pain and remorse? Recherche du temps de perdu(searching for lost times) Is it? Completing circles? Finding closure? Or is it simply human instinct, like the elephants also do, to return to where it all started for us all?

This modern rendition of Shakespeare's Othello, in a South African context, plays itself out in a small Karroo town where a white woman is murdered, and her Colored(mixed race) husband is arrested.

Oom Blik van Blerk (uncle Blik)-(The nobleman Brabanto in Othello),former mayor of the town Alfredville, had a bitter view on his daughter's betrayal, of marrying a colored man(Othello), who was a veteran of the Umkonto Isizwe (Spear Of The Nation) armed forces of the ANC. Desirée (Desdemona) went against all that was sacred to her people, when she returned from the university of Stellenbosch, joined the multiracial tennis club in town, instead of her school's tennis club where she worked as a teacher, met the new Colored chief of police, Hector Williams--an affirmative Action, cadre deployment, appointment at the local police station. Not only were whites pushed out of their positions, leaving many families destitute by these kind of actions, but Desirée also denounced her heritage for which so many of the young white men offered up their lives in the battle against the Communists(ANC). Her actions went against the grain of both black and white inhabitants of the town. Emotions were stirred in a community where gossip was the main activity, the daily main focus, in a town nestled in an otherwise vast sea of silence over the barren, semi-aridness of the Ghanta Karoo.

When she is murdered, a town is dropped into a racial conflict in which politics boils over an already sensitive landscape.

Peter Jacobs, a Jewish-Afrikaner, ex patriot, and nephew of the deceased, arrived from London where he lived for decades since 1988. He dodged the draft into the army after leaving school by getting enrolled at the university of Sussex where he eventually graduated and became a journalist and citizen of Britain. He never would have returned if it wasn't for the murder of his niece, which allowed him to write a story about the real circumstances and social mileu of the murder. That was his intentions. He found his school friend, Bennie Nienaber(Lago in Othello) as the acting station commander until a new black person could be appointed. Bennie was now married to Chrisna (Emilia in Othello).

Never in his wildest dreams did Peter, the protagonist, expected to be caught up by the greatest irony of his life...

I sense that there is a thin line between absolute control and a complete surrender to a horrific breakdown of reason. The fine line, I tell myself, is irony. Cling to it like Theseus clinging to Ariadne's clue in the labyrinth of the Minotaur, conscious of the terrible fate that awaits you if you let go.

With multiple characters in place, the political and social setting established, the semi-arid environment of a drought-stricken Karroo town spelled out, an atmospheric tale of human deceit, loyalty, love and family became the richly-textured canvas of Lost Ground.

The ending is nothing but irony in bold print. Not unexpected, but debatable at best. What an excellent read!

For South African readers, this book can be regarded as a mix between the works of André P Brink, Ettienne Van Heerden, and Deon Meyer. For any other readers it is an excellent diameter of the current South African landscape in its rainbow reality, in a similar narrative style as Joseph Conrad or Henry James.

RECOMMENDED!

[Alison Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is probably my best MH read to date; I've put the book on my annual Best Reads List for 2013. Its a subtle skilful book, giving an accurate picture of life in the 'new' South Africa. There are no easy answers to the unexpected murder mystery set in a very smal Karoo town.
The beginning of the book is funny, with a devastating picture of small-town life, but grows darker as events progress. The solution to the puzzle is unexpected - both tragic and inconclusive.

[Gemma Field · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not sure if this is one of the best or the worst books I've ever read.

[Keith Currie · Rating 4 out of 5]

South Africa post apartheid is no simple place, the rainbow nation presenting its inhabitants with the problems of accommodating old prejudice with new reality. This is not just true of the great conurbations like Johannesburg, but even the small towns or dorps of the Little Karoo, like the quiet backwater of Alfredville in which this novel is set.

The narrator, a freelance journalist, who abandoned his home in Alfredville to avoid military service for the apartheid regime, and who has lived and worked in London for over twenty years, makes a return to his hometown. He has come to research the circumstances of the murder of his cousin, apparently by her black husband, who also happens to be chief of police and a former ANC activist. As he blunders about a town he once knew and interacts with new acquaintances and friends from the past, he uncovers quite a different story from what he had expected.

The book's title could refer to a number of lost grounds: the retreat from power of the white population comes to mind. But the narrator, Peter Jacobs, has lost the most ground and doesn't realise it; he has lost the place which could be defined as home. What he thinks he knows and what he actually knows are entirely separate and lead to disaster. His pat idea of the murder of Desiree as a kind of South African Othello is so wide of the mark, that it only emphasises his selfish but understated arrogance.

Peopled with fascinating characters in a land coping with violent change, Lost Ground is a fine novel with an absorbing plot and ideas which touch the heart, especially in its final chapters.

[Joseph Schreiber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engaging, gripping tale of murder, loss and a man's struggle to make sense of himself. Peter Jacobs is a writer who returns to the small town in the Little Karoo where he grew up, 22 years after leaving South Africa to study in England and avoid conscription. His cousin has been murdered, her black husband has been arrested and Peter, seeing the story potential is drawn back. But what he finds awakens many ghosts and wounds.

A terrific, well paced story that is carried above much genre fiction by Heyns' powerful use of language.

[Jessica Knight · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must be one of the best contemporary SA authors with a dark sense of humour, strong characterisation and less of the bleakness of a Coetzee or Brink

[Marion Roux · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is about the solving of the murder of a small town girl. The book starts off very slowly, long-winded at times, but the descriptions of the 'dorp' are very true to the Little Karoo.
Large sections of the book are written with delightful. wry humour (such as the 'nudge-nudge, wink-wink' description of the lunch date of the story teller with his aunt, uncle and cousin).
Then there are sudden swings into more sinister contents and narration.
Ultimately a shocking turn of events.
Recommended reading.

[Dianne Hartley · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rubbish. Too long and not worth it. My first book by this author and the last.

[Hjwoodward · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Michiel Heyns and this particular story had resonance for me, partly because my sister moved to England many years ago. The novel begins with Peter Jacobs, a Jewish-Afrikaner, who arrives from London where he lived for decades since 1988. He never would have returned if it weren't for a murder of a family member of his. He wants to write a story about the real circumstances and social mileu of the murder. That was his intention. He knows that the former mayor of this small town in the Karroo feels his daughter betrayed him by marrying a coloured man who was a veteran of the Umkonto Isizwe. Desirée married Hector Williams, the new chief of police. When she is murdered, the town is dropped into a racial conflict in which politics boils over an already sensitive landscape.
The political and social setting, against the semi-arid environment of a drought-stricken Karroo town, spells out an atmospheric tale of human deceit, loyalty, love and family.
This novel depicts the South African landscape in its rainbow reality, a similar narrative style to that of Henry James.

[Lisa Lazarus · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me a while to get use to Michiel's long sentences. In the beginning, I found his language over-written in a way; but as the story progressed his language was more fluid, less worked, and I loved the characters and particularly the setting. The story is set in a little Karoo town in the Cape, in South Africa. Most of the characters have lived there all their lives. The protagonist grew up there, then left when he completed school to avoid going into compulsory military service. He comes back after transformation in South Africa and finds the town both changed and unchanged. He comes back ostensibly to write a story on a murder that took place, but as the story unfolds he realises he came back to explore much more than the murder. It is part crime genre, part coming of age novel. I enjoyed it and found the description of South Africa, post transformation, fresh and different from the flood of novels that have been written about this period.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

The story starts off slowly describing Peter's arrival back in his hometown, the town and the people who he knew and those who now meets are described but the story really picks up when we learn why Peter is back. I found myself drawn into the story at this point and couldn't then stop reading. The pace and the build up to the end is just right. This was the first book by Michiel Heyns that I have read and will definitely be reading the other books published.

[Stephanie Muller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michiel Heyns's command of English is admirable, as is his perceptiveness.

[Robyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant!

[Димитър Тодоров · Rating 4 out of 5]

Прочетох я с голямо удоволствие. Южноафриканска история, номинално криминална, но написана с много точен език, английска ирония и внимание към най-др��бни, но характеризиращи детайли в обстановката и културата на героите. Действието се развива в измислен град в Малкото Кару, за който гадая, че прототип е бил Монтагю. Има убийство, има върнал се емигрант отпреди промените, има расово-смесени двойки, и хетеро, и хомо, има активистка за женски права и добруване, има полицаи с трудно минало, има конгоански имигрант, има консервативни бури. Има и куксистъри !