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Tess
A gut wrenching story of a Muizenberg sex worker, Tess, who pops painkillers by the handful and sells her body to strangers. When a condom breaks, Tess’s life swings one eighty degrees. She gives up her drugs until she can get to an abortion clinic. Her cold turkey opens up a window in her mind, whipping Tess into a shattering understanding of how she got here. Tess’s quirky humour, raw honesty and deep love of beauty lead her to find redemption in astonishing places. This book has a huge heart, like Tess, revealing that there is something in everyone that cannot be touched. Not by human hands. Not ever.
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Published February 1, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 17, 2017
According to Wikipedia, "the [shark] dive industry in Gansbaai, South Africa consists of six boat operators with each boat guiding 30 people each day. With fees between £50 and £150 [R900 - R2,700] per person, a single live shark that visits each boat can create anywhere between £9,000 and £27,000 [R160,000 - R480,000] of revenue daily."
The sex trade industry in Muizenberg, 150km north on the same shark-infested coastline, consists of a number of sex workers, each servicing several local and foreign clients each day. With fees between R50 and R100 (£3 and £6) per client, a prostitute operating without a pimp can earn just enough to put a humble roof over her head and basic food in her belly, and those of her children. But it's a dangerous, sometimes deadly game, and those working for a pimp, usually a gangster from the notorious Cape Flats nearby, will earn virtually nothing. Instead, her money will be used to support his tik or buttons habit.
Tess is one of these solo-operating Muizenberg sex workers. Sassy and streetwise, with an acerbic wit and tough as nails, she lives in a wind-battered block of dilapidated flats and plies her illicit trade at the south end of Prince George Drive. Just a couple hundred metres away, over the main beachfront road and across the sand, a largely unseen population of cold-blooded great white sharks cruises and hunts beneath the waves. The chilling parallels between the two juxtaposed worlds - a clearly defined pecking order between predators and prey - is not lost on me.
Through gripping storytelling and colourful prose, the author takes us behind the picture-postcard façade of the Cape Town suburb as painted by tourism brochures, and into the day-to-day life of Tess and her impoverished, marginalised community.
We learn that a month after Tess was conceived, her mother's lover drowned in the ocean. When Tess was two, her mother married. When she gave birth to Tess's half-sister four years later, her husband started sexually abusing Tess. The abuse at the hands of her step-father went on for most of Tess's childhood. Her mother was fully aware, but feigned ignorance.
Tess dropped out of high school in Standard 8 (Grade 10) and left home, moving 100km north from the seaside town of Hibberdene on the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast where she had grown up, to the big port city of Durban. At the age of 15, she found work in an escort agency. By the time she was 21, she had worked for three different agencies, and developed an addiction to over-the-counter painkillers, which she used to numb her physical shell and anaesthetise the demons within.
Fast-forward to the present day in Muizenberg and, through some cruel twists of fate, the now 26-year-old Tess finds herself facing a succession of challenges of nightmarish proportions. But with the help of a motley crew of friends - soul connections she forges in the most unlikely of places - we bear witness to a profound transformation. Tess manages to extricate herself from a dead-end life of hooking and hustling, and starts moving towards a brighter future filled with hope and healing.
Nine times out of ten, I prefer a book to its film adaptation. But this is one of those rare cases where I'd actually recommend watching the movie first. For me it really helped bring the characters and setting to life. Despite its gritty subject matter, it is an exquisitely written story. One of those books I read slowly, savouring every word, not wanting it to end. A solid five-star rating from me. Honestly, one of the best movies I've seen and best books I've read in 2017.
NB. Trigger warnings include: rape, sexual assault, sexual violence, sexual abuse, molestation, abortion, and adoption.
The sex trade industry in Muizenberg, 150km north on the same shark-infested coastline, consists of a number of sex workers, each servicing several local and foreign clients each day. With fees between R50 and R100 (£3 and £6) per client, a prostitute operating without a pimp can earn just enough to put a humble roof over her head and basic food in her belly, and those of her children. But it's a dangerous, sometimes deadly game, and those working for a pimp, usually a gangster from the notorious Cape Flats nearby, will earn virtually nothing. Instead, her money will be used to support his tik or buttons habit.
Tess is one of these solo-operating Muizenberg sex workers. Sassy and streetwise, with an acerbic wit and tough as nails, she lives in a wind-battered block of dilapidated flats and plies her illicit trade at the south end of Prince George Drive. Just a couple hundred metres away, over the main beachfront road and across the sand, a largely unseen population of cold-blooded great white sharks cruises and hunts beneath the waves. The chilling parallels between the two juxtaposed worlds - a clearly defined pecking order between predators and prey - is not lost on me.
Through gripping storytelling and colourful prose, the author takes us behind the picture-postcard façade of the Cape Town suburb as painted by tourism brochures, and into the day-to-day life of Tess and her impoverished, marginalised community.
We learn that a month after Tess was conceived, her mother's lover drowned in the ocean. When Tess was two, her mother married. When she gave birth to Tess's half-sister four years later, her husband started sexually abusing Tess. The abuse at the hands of her step-father went on for most of Tess's childhood. Her mother was fully aware, but feigned ignorance.
Tess dropped out of high school in Standard 8 (Grade 10) and left home, moving 100km north from the seaside town of Hibberdene on the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast where she had grown up, to the big port city of Durban. At the age of 15, she found work in an escort agency. By the time she was 21, she had worked for three different agencies, and developed an addiction to over-the-counter painkillers, which she used to numb her physical shell and anaesthetise the demons within.
Fast-forward to the present day in Muizenberg and, through some cruel twists of fate, the now 26-year-old Tess finds herself facing a succession of challenges of nightmarish proportions. But with the help of a motley crew of friends - soul connections she forges in the most unlikely of places - we bear witness to a profound transformation. Tess manages to extricate herself from a dead-end life of hooking and hustling, and starts moving towards a brighter future filled with hope and healing.
Nine times out of ten, I prefer a book to its film adaptation. But this is one of those rare cases where I'd actually recommend watching the movie first. For me it really helped bring the characters and setting to life. Despite its gritty subject matter, it is an exquisitely written story. One of those books I read slowly, savouring every word, not wanting it to end. A solid five-star rating from me. Honestly, one of the best movies I've seen and best books I've read in 2017.
NB. Trigger warnings include: rape, sexual assault, sexual violence, sexual abuse, molestation, abortion, and adoption.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 3, 2019
Originally published under the title 'Whiplash', 'Tess' covers a year in the life of the eponymous Muizemberg prostitute. The first half of the book is cold and chilling, narrated in a fragmented style of a woman high on painkillers or desperately wanting them. As the story progresses the reader and Tess slowly uncover her past, a past she has forgotten, and discover how a young woman could end up on the street.
The book needs recognition for not only making a prostitute human, but also for giving her a very big heart. The other women in the book need recognition too, from the other women who work the streets, the refugee neighbour who was cruelly injured and who has been separated from her family, and the former-nun who is now a belly dancing instructor. It highlights the strength and compassion women have, even in the lowest of situations.
The book highlights abuse of women: as children, as violence, sexually etc. It makes the reader think about the events in a woman's life that could make her end up being a prostitute - because no one does it for fun.
The ending, while satisfying, was the reason for the drop in a star. I loved that Tess had a pleasant ending, that she found some dignity and self-respect, but I couldn't help but feel that it was wishful thinking on the part of Farren, especially with everything Tess had gone through. For Tess's sake though, I was happy.
The book needs recognition for not only making a prostitute human, but also for giving her a very big heart. The other women in the book need recognition too, from the other women who work the streets, the refugee neighbour who was cruelly injured and who has been separated from her family, and the former-nun who is now a belly dancing instructor. It highlights the strength and compassion women have, even in the lowest of situations.
The book highlights abuse of women: as children, as violence, sexually etc. It makes the reader think about the events in a woman's life that could make her end up being a prostitute - because no one does it for fun.
The ending, while satisfying, was the reason for the drop in a star. I loved that Tess had a pleasant ending, that she found some dignity and self-respect, but I couldn't help but feel that it was wishful thinking on the part of Farren, especially with everything Tess had gone through. For Tess's sake though, I was happy.
December 6, 2025
Challenging but ultimately uplifting.
Touching novel that shines a light on sexual violence but also celebrates women’s ability to care and heal. The language and style were sometimes difficult for me to understand.
Touching novel that shines a light on sexual violence but also celebrates women’s ability to care and heal. The language and style were sometimes difficult for me to understand.
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January 13, 2017– 'My dear, when Jesus enters you, you know know HE is the only...'
'Look, he's a man. I'm a chick. And you want Jesus to enter me? I have enough of that every damn day, thanks. –
– I threw my name away at False Bay Holiday. –
– I sew the rands, I sew the minutes. Sequin by sequin, I sew the time through the day. This way no one gets to touch my think skin. On the road my nerves would be shot, my skin would be screeching. The sun hissing though the salt air. –
– Did you know hope can make you claustrophobic? It's from happiness stuffed down, I think. –
– What if they are screaming and nobody can hear? –
– They must have trashed all the proof of the holy women. I reckon Jesus's mother, Mary, was one She knew what the hell she was doing here. She knew she had a special job. She went, Her everyone, here's a kid who can help you remember. –
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews