These Are Not Gentle People

by Andrew Harding

At dusk, on a warm evening in 2016, a group of forty men gathered in the corner of a dusty field on a farm outside Parys in the Free State. Some were in fury. Others treated the whole thing as a joke - a game. The events of the next two hours would come to haunt them all. They would rip families apart, prompt suicide attempts, breakdowns, divorce, bankruptcy, threats of violent revenge and acts of unforgivable treachery.

These Are Not Gentle People is the story of that night, and of what happened next. It's a courtroom drama, a profound exploration of collective guilt and individual justice, and a fast-paced literary thriller.

Award-winning foreign correspondent and author Andrew Harding traces the impact of one moment of collective barbarism on a fragile community - exploding lies, cover-ups, political meddling and betrayals, and revealing the inner lives of those involved with extraordinary clarity.

The book is also a mesmerising examination of a small town trying to cope with a trauma that threatens to tear it in two - as such, it is as much a journey into the heart of modern South Africa as it is a gripping tale of crime, punishment and redemption.

When a whole community is on trial, who pays the price?

Genres: Nonfiction, True Crime, South Africa, Africa, Crime, Book Club, Thriller

Kindle Edition

First published September 19, 2019

About the author

I'm the BBC's Africa Correspondent, based in Johannesburg. I'm the author of "These Are Not Gentle People," a true-crime novel set in South Africa and published in South Africa, the UK and the Netherlands. The book has been turned into a BBC Radio 4 series and podcast, "Blood Lands." Alexander McCall Smith described the book as "a masterpiece." Philippe Sands called it "utterly gripping, timely and shocking. "This is In Cold Blood meets Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil. Believe me, Andrew Harding has given us an instant classic," said Justice Malala.
I also wrote the internationally acclaimed non-fiction book, "The Mayor of Mogadishu" - the tale of a nomad, turned street brawler, turned refugee who left his family in London to return to take charge of the war-ravaged ruins of Somalia's capital. It was praised by the New York Times, The Economist, The Washington Post and chosen as one of NPR's books of 2016.

Reviews

[Beata · Rating 4 out of 5]

In January 2016, two young black men are caught on a field near Parys, Free State in South Africa, by a group of around forty white local residents in what was called a pursuit after the attack on a white elderly farmer. The men were beaten, viciously tortured, and died in the wake of their severe injuries. The crowd, while not everybody was active in the physical abuse, did not stop those who were.
The book is an account of what happened to Samuel and Simon, but more importantly it reveals the complicated trial and the mutual dependency of the inhabitants in a relatively small community where people are related by blood or marriage, or by employment.
Mr Harding covers the nuances regarding the justice brought, takes us to the townships where black people live in most appalling conditions, all set against the most beautiful landscape created by a meteor which struck our planet around 2 billion years ago, now called Vredefort Dome.
Some moments were hard to read, like when the names of the victims are mixed or when they are referred to as numbers and letters, not by their names. What a lack of respect!
A shocking and tough read.
*A big thank-you to Andrew Harding, Quercus Books, and NetGalley for arc in exchange for my honest review.*

[8stitches 9lives · Rating 5 out of 5]

These Are Not Gentle People is a fast-paced, important work of South African true crime and the case that has defined a nation. Since early 2016 South Africans have become gripped by a trial that has been taking place in the small town of Parys, south of Johannesburg, where are a group of white farmers are accused of murdering two black farmhands. The white farmers say it was a question of self-defence: the two black labourers were threatening them and their families. The black community claim that the farmhands had simply gone to the farm to ask for unpaid wages. The case is a microcosm of the racial, political and financial tensions that are increasingly worrying South Africans, but also a gripping character-driven tale of grief, fear and anger in a small-town community. The truth of what actually happened has been slippery.

Andrew Harding, the BBC's Africa correspondent, lives in Johannesburg. From the moment the murders took place, Andrew has been following this case closely, interviewing everyone involved, from the accused white farmers, to the bereaved family of the black farmhands, to the female Indian magistrate, to the policemen and detectives on the trail of the truth (or not). He has sat through hours of the trial, and has put together a brilliantly kaleidoscopic picture of what might have happened, and who thinks what about it - weaving all these various points of view into an extraordinarily fast-paced work of true crime. All the dialogue is meticulously based on real interviews and yet it reads like a novel. Andrew's powers of description - of landscape, people and place - as well of his sense of a good story, are phenomenal.

As a true crime enthusiast, this was a no-brainer; I knew it would get my full attention as the case is a fascinating but harrowing and terrifying one, however, what I didn't realise was that it would grab me by the throat and refuse to let go. Even some time after finishing it, my memory of it has not diminished. The emotional intelligence, elegance of prose, compassionate handling and determination to portray each side of the story shines through on every page, and I must admit it was also completely riveting and intricately detailed too. It's clear Harding has carried out extensive research into the case and its racial, financial and political complications and the implications for wider society in South Africa. If you enjoy true crime then I cannot recommend this highly enough; it is an absolute must-read which has so much more to it in terms of nuance and depth than merely its page-turning qualities. Many thanks to MacLehose Press for an ARC.

[Liz Barnsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

These Are Not Gentle People is an utterly compelling true crime story using narrative non fiction to really dig deep and engage the reader on many emotional levels.

An act of violence splits a community down the middle, Andrew Harding explores both the act and the people with an insightful eye and with various perspectives offering a bird’s eye view on character and event. This reads like a complex thriller but this really happened and the effects on those involved comes to life within the words of the author in vivid detail.

A truly stunning exploration of how one moment in time has far reaching consequences, These Are Not Gentle People ultimately tells the tale of a community in flux. It is part mystery, part courtroom drama, all intense character study and comes highly recommended from me.

[Elisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

🇿🇦 THESE ARE NOT GENTLE PEOPLE by Andrew Harding 🇿🇦

This book follows the citizens of Parys after two black boys have been killed in a farm field outside of Parys in January 2016. They were surrounded by fourty white local farmers after the boys' so-called attack on an elderly white farmer. It's unclear who did the actual killing, but what's for sure is that no one stepped in and stopped them. Harding moved to South Africa for a couple of years to talk to as many people as possible and in his book, he tells their stories. This book is a courtroom drama and reveals how the painful Apartheid history is still impacting these communities and the trial.

There were a lot of passages that were hard to read and the disinterest and disrespect towards the two boys, Samuel and Simon, was painful. Harding's reading was impeccable however and only after finishing the book did I discover that this was a narrated non-fiction book. With our book club, we researched the story a little more and found news articles on the trial and even pictures, which was all shocking to read and see having read the story..

For anyone interested in South Africa, I'd definitely recommend this book, because you learn so much from it and Harding wrote it so beautifully!

[Ruben · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been on holidays to South Africa and have rarely seen a more beautiful country. But good luck if you need medical help, good luck if you need the police or the legal system to defend you.

This is not only a thrilling true crime account of a gruesome double murder case, it also gives great insight in post-Apartheid South Africa in the countryside.

Two black men, presumed to have committed a so-called 'farm attack', are caught by white farmers and a few hours later are dead. But what happened exactly and who did what?

The style of writing is matter-of-factly, but the facts speak for themselves. Everything is politicised, everything coloured by race. The difference between black and white is astonishing. The incompetence of the authorities as shocking as the murder case itself.

Highly recommended!

[Ed Stoddard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is simply superb: narrative non-fiction as art. Harding, a BBC correspondent, has found a microcosm of South Africa, with its stark social divisions and tensions, but also common decency and breath-taking natural beauty, in the riverside town of Parys. In the austral summer of 2016, amid the bucolic farmlands, a violent incident occurred that left two black men dead. Several white men, burly farmers and a policeman, subsequently faced prosecution in a trial that sheds an unflattering light on South Africa's justice system. Stay tuned for my full review in the Daily Maverick ...

[David Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was not possible to put this book down. At times I was out of breath. There were moments when I felt as if I had been kicked in the stomach. Andrew Harding has expertly told the story, in a 360-degree fashion, of a numbingly gripping court case in a small South African town. The case and its influence on surrounding communities is, in Andrew’s words, a microcosm for much that is the complicated social, political, and economic experiment that is South Africa. The book is an emotional roller coaster – describing what, in my case, I have been observing at times from a distance and at other times up close for close to 40 years. That we need to recognise that there is more than one way to tell the truth and that we must acknowledge this is what drives me, and, not wanting or able to put words in Andrew’s mouth – I’d hazard a guess that it is the same for him. Bravo. The strongest of 5-star ratings possible.

[Denira Varma · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beyond the fact that this is an important read for anyone in our country, this book is remarkably well crafted. The writing and pace read like fiction and reading it, was my earnest wish that it actually was.

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A disturbing, harrowing and really quite shocking story of a crime in South Africa, and the effect it had, and no doubt still has, on the whole community, both black and white. Two young black men are brutally attacked and killed by a group of white farmers. Their subsequent arrest and the trial that followed are described in great detail, as are the repercussions for all involved. I didn’t always find it an easy read as there are so many characters implicated that it was hard at times to distinguish them one from another, but nevertheless this is a minor quibble. It’s a timely and important book, meticulously researched, and a reminder that racism is alive and well in South Africa as well as in the US. Highly recommended.

[Pascale · Rating 3 out of 5]

A group of white farmers go on the rampage when one of their elders is reportedly attacked by black farm hands. The 2 blacks end up dead, and an ugly trial ensues. 4 years after the events, everybody walks free. Unsurprisingly, this is just another instance of black lives don't matter. However, in the process the inter-related white families have turned upon each other and showed that solidarity is just a word in that supposedly tight-knit community. Harding doesn't pretend to know exactly what happened but what, to me, is beyond doubt is the collective guilt of these men and boys for whom killing a black person is just second nature. At no point does a single one of them express remorse. All they want is for the whole thing to go away, which it does in the end, because this is South Africa.

[Craig West · Rating 3 out of 5]

At dusk, on a warm evening in 2016, a group of forty men gathered in the corner of a dusty field on a farm outside Parys in the Free State. Some were in fury. Others treated the whole thing as a joke - a game. The events of the next two hours would come to haunt them all. They would rip families apart, prompt suicide attempts, breakdowns, divorce, bankruptcy, threats of violent revenge and acts of unforgivable treachery.

A mesmerising book that grips you from the beginning. It's hard to believe the cruelty humans are subjected to.

Andrew Harding has captured exactly the trauma South Africa has to overcome.

[Lynda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must read for every South African !!

I am a white woman born and raised in Rhodesia , with incredible black men as home helpers whom I spent long hours with as a child and learned many values from as I did my homework while they completed ironing or other chores in our family home. Moved to S A as a young adult and trained in the nursing profession Married Into a Afrikaans/English family with new family members in farming communities. I have had home help from amazing women over the fifty years of our marriage. I can relate to every single character in this riveting book Absolutely have such a compulsion to get friends and family to read this amazing true story

[Zelda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reminded me of In Cold Blood by Capote. A gripping read.

[Pam Magwaza · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two black men are violently and barbarically killed on a farm outside Parys in Free State by a group of white farmers. This sounds like a scene straight out of Apartheid South Africa, but it happened, unsurprisingly, in 2016 in post-apartheid South Africa.

I say unsurprisingly because as a black person, I am starkly aware of the systemic racism [and classism] that is constantly inflicted on black people by white supremacy in this country and around the world. For the economically disadvantaged black person living in South Africa, this violence can mean death – a gruesome and violent death.

These are not gentle people by British journalist and author, Andrew Harding is a nonfiction narrative book based on the murder of two men, Samuel Tjixa and Simon Jubeba and the subsequent trial that followed. Several white farmers and a policeman were prosecuted for their death.

In January 2016, a WhatsApp group message was sent about an alleged attack on an elderly white farmer. A group of about 40 white farmers and their sons responded to the message and drove out to the farm, chased down the two men and violently assaulted them, which lead to their deaths.

The fact of the story is that Samuel Tjixa and Simon Jubeba were on the elderly farmer’s plot that day, their reasons for being there, however, remain unclear. Some reports of the incident and witnesses say they were there to demand their wages, while others branded them would-be robbers who attacked the elderly man first. Andrew Harding, rightfully, leaves this unanswered in the book.

These are not gentle people is incredibly well-written and near impossible to put down. The author showed his journalistic prowess through the amount of attention to detail he included in his work. From the landscape of the deceptively beautiful town to the deteriorating relationships between the ‘characters’ of his story and their internal dialogue – he captured it all and turned it into a truly captivating story. Although the book reads like a classic murder mystery and leaves the reader curious of the outcome, one thing is clear from the moment the farmers get bail, no justice will be found here – as is often the case for black, economically disadvantaged victims.

Where Harding succeeded was in the picture he painted of the class divide in Parys. While one main [white] family owns most of the land in Parys and some have property on golf courses, the black people live in shacks, where young women are forced into relationships with older men for protection from crime, a victim’s mother has to walk almost 28km on foot to get to the nearest police station to information about her dead son and grave sites are so overcrowded that people easily lose where they buried a loved one.

The people most affected by this incident, however, are the people the book spends the least time on. The white farmer’s families frustrations, heartache and fears are told in incredible detail. There was no doubt in my mind after I put the book down that, this incident completely changed their lives for the worst. It almost begged my sympathy for them and their families – like this incident was some unjust event that had befallen them, yet it wasn’t. It was the actions of the Van der Weshuizen clan and their cruelty that got them into a near five-year long trial where they feared a life in jail.

The victims: Samuel Tjixa and Simon Jubeba’s families, Samuel’s mother, Ruth Qokotha, his girlfriend Naledi and his brother’s Elias and Lawrance, Simon Jubeba’s sisters, Susan, Dimakatso and Jemina, his aunt Selina and grandmother Norma and his friends Ricard and Bab Mbele – it was the full extent of their pain and suffering that wasn’t explored in its entirety.

In addition to the violent poverty and economic abuse they already suffered in their day-to-day life, this trial added a weight of grief and dehumanization that they honestly didn’t deserve. They were used by political parties, the media and ultimately failed by the law.

They had to sit through court proceedings where their closest family members were stripped of their humanity and their names were often forgotten, mixed up or mispronounced. They were dragged through a 5-year trial to where they often didn’t even have enough money to attend. They suffered bitterly and yet Harding was unable to truly convey this pain as much as he did with the farmer’s families.

Black pain – whether physical, emotional or psychological – is often hard to understand when you’re not black, it’s incredibly difficult to fathom suffering at that level. Unfortunately, this shortcoming was evident in how Harding narrated this story.

[Megan Doney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I lived in this province for a year, though a good distance from the town of Parys.
Little is just in SA.

[Krystelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Please note this is a 3.5.

This book pulls no punches, giving a bleak and terrifyingly realistic image of the world of South Africa and the pervasive social issues that have plagued the country ever since colonialism. The reckless violence, anger, and racism that touches every single facet of the country is jarring, and this book lays out in lurid detail the exact way that these issues have affected the country.

The saddest thing in all of this is the fact that there is no justice to be found here for the men who were killed. It is horrific to realise that there are so many people serving their own agendas to a point that there is a complete loss of the point of the investigation- the minutiae of people's lives have taken over the real story here, and it seems unlikely that any court verdict will be able to accomplish real justice.

I think, while the book is well written and follows the action very successfully, but while the story has reached some conclusion, I think the failing is in the fact that a story like this will never feel completely finished. The book does a marvellous job of following something that cannot be appropriately concluded, but it could've gone into more detail as to the racial tensions in South Africa and their full context.

[Tilly Fitzgerald · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of a shocking true crime which tore a South African community apart. Although this is true crime, Harding’s writing makes it feel almost like a work of fiction as it has such great pace and keeps you turning the page to find out what happens next. I found I was grateful for this as the violence and brutality of the crime is hard to come to terms with as something that not just one, but 40 human beings can do to another.
I found one of the most heartbreaking things was the fact that so many people involved didn’t even bother to differentiate between the two victims, and when researching further I found multiple news articles with incorrect names for the victims - as though they don’t even deserve their own identities after the indignity they have already suffered.
With so much focus on America’s racial tensions at the moment, this is an essential read to show that racism is all too alive even in a country where Apartheid ended over 25years ago. A brutal, compelling read - be prepared to spend a lot of time searching the news for updates after reading this, as it stays with you.

[Zak · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most difficult books I've ever read. Really well written, but brings home so strongly that these horrific situations exist just down the road, and still exist - It removes all possible levels of abstraction. Really balanced as well - Both in the fear that farmers live in, and the horrific un-human way that (these farmers) saw fellow human beings. It raises all sorts of very visceral challenges about the country we live in - Should really be mandatory reading for all of us.

[Lili Bammens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dit boek is geen thriller of politieroman. Het is non-fictie en vertelt over de dood van twee zwarten in Parys, Zuid Afrika, die omkomen na een gewelddadig treffen met blanke boeren, en van de rechtszaak achteraf. Het boek geeft een beeld van de toestand in Zuid Afrika nu zonder oordeel te vellen of partij te kiezen. Boeiend maar af en toe ook wat slordig verteld vond ik.

[Amy Pyles · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I made a mistake in doing the audiobook rather than the physical copy. I usually don’t have this trouble, but I spent all my energy trying to keep the people straight and ended up frustrated and not caring enough about the actual story. This should have been a compelling (true) story, and I think it was for most readers, but it was just a bust for me.

[Andrew Harding · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks so much for your interest in my new book. If you have any comments, do please get in touch with me via my website http://www.andrew-harding.com/

[Charlotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

eARC received from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

These Are Not Gentle People is a true story of a murder that took place in South Africa in 2016. Forty men gathered in a field, successful in capturing two men accused of robbing a fellow farmer. The events over the next two hours are unclear, but it ended with the two thieves rushed to hospital where they died shortly after. In this book, Harding examines the town, the victim's families, and the accused. We go from the field, to the courtroom, looking at race in South Africa, and the motivations for the murder.

Enjoy feels like the wrong word to use to describe this book, but I would definitely call it interesting. This was a case I had never heard of before, and it definitely awakened a range of emotions in me. I was disgusted, I wasn't sure who to trust, and at points, I was just plain confused. The confusion is definitely a feature of the case, it appeared to me that even at the end no one really knew what had happened in the field that night, it was he said vs he said, with farmers turning on one another. But I also felt some of the confusion could be attributed to the book. Part of this was to do with the formating of the review copy I received, but I felt that names were dropped and I kept losing track of who was who. There was a handy guide to the 'cast' at the start, but on an EReader it's not easy to keep flicking back and forth.

One of the things I really appreciated about this book, was the time Andrew Harding spent with the victims' family, particularly Samuel's mother Ruth. A point the book really drives home, it how little the investigation and subsequent trial focused on the victims themselves, Simon Jubeba and Samuel Tjixa, with lawyers often getting the pair confused or treating them as interchangeable. I found the view into the live of Ruth to be somewhat harrowing, no one notified her personally of her son's death, and even when she wanted to travel to find out what happened to him she had to hitch a life, same as when she went to court for the trial. This is in contrast to the wealthy lives of the farmers.

These Are Not Gentle People is marketed as a true story, but how much is true and how much is story is somewhat unknown. The most frustrating thing about this story is how we will likely never know what happened to the two young men. Even the perpetrators that claimed to be telling the truth were clearly trying to save their own skin, everyone was happy to deal what other people had supposedly done, but their own involvement was limited to watching on, or just a punch or a slap. Whatever happened that night, it is clear that there were no innocent bystanders. No one tried to stop what was happening, and even now it is unlikely that anyone is telling the truth.

Overall I enjoyed the political aspects of this book, but I do wonder if it is somewhat exploitative of the case. At times I forgot this was a true story, and that sort of made me feel a little uneasy. Not quite sure how to put my feelings into words, but I think this case needed very delicate handling and this perhaps missed the mark for me.

[Christopher McKeon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like a South African version of In Cold Blood, Andrew Harding’s account of the fallout from killing of two black men in a dusty Free State field is a gripping tale.

But, more impressively, it is also an exploration of modern South Africa despite his conscious decision to make no explicit “state of the nation” claims. Without ever preaching or editorialising - without ever allowing his own voice to intrude at all - Harding paints a picture of a fractured nation that has fallen short of Mandela’s optimistic dream of 1994. On the one hand we have the white farmers, perhaps justifiably afraid in their remote, vulnerable homesteads, but who also still seem to regard black South Africans as beneath them and who can dish out a beating to two thieves without a second thought and then feel aggrieved when the police investigate after the two men wind up dead.

Then there’s the police and the courts, still not functioning properly. There’s political interference, incompetence and delays that reveal a struggling state and deprive all involved of any real justice (not to mention also contributing to the farmer’s fears that nobody will help them if they’re attacked).

And finally, the victims - two black men whose identities are lost in the trial, seemingly irrelevant beyond their status as “the deceased” to the extent that their names are repeatedly mixed up. Their families struggle to attend the trial - some aren’t even told when the verdict will be read. But also, while the focus of the whites is on the security of their farms and, for some, spurious claims of a “white genocide” it is still black South Africans who suffer most - poverty, crime and degradation by rich white farmers. South Africa still has a long way to go.

[Caro Robson · Rating 5 out of 5]

"...in this inspiring, frustrating, fractured country, it is possible for two or more realities to coexist, to orbit each other, and that wounds- old and new - can only heal properly when we make the effort to recognise, and to acknowledge, someone else's truth."

A superbly executed book. Fast paced, well written, unputdownable.

Though I do not agree that the farming community of Parys represents, as the author believes, a microcosm of SA at large (living in Johannesburg myself, it is profoundly different), Harding has succeeded in capturing a particular South African reality that sometimes feels uncomfortably close to pre-1994.

Using the serious assault and subsequent death of two Black men by a group of White men as the central axis, we gain insight into the justice(?) system and everyday lives of people who share a hometown but live dramatically different lives.

The author shifts his focus between these groups and individuals effortlessly, painting a complete picture of the shattering effect the murders had on everyone affected.

A must-read for anyone interested in SA current affairs. Actually, a must-read for anyone looking for a damn good book. Just be aware - given the subject matter, the book is very upsetting at times.

[Jane Hampson]

I read this book and was saddened to find that poor black lives dying in a violent senseless manner still occurs in South Africa with as little concern or serious thought just as it did when I grew up there in the 1970s/1980s. Poor black lives were taken in a brutal manner then with a lack of respect for the human factor of their lives, even their identities were not given the respect any other human in a trial would expect. The callous manner these dead men encountered when alive did not even improve when their murder was put forth during the trial. And yes they were murdered most brutally a body that sustains brain damage is usually encountered during an traumatic car accident, these men meet the white brutality of the farmers who might as well as have been a ten truck trailer driving over them for their bodies to have sustained the traumas they did, the justice system failed them, the medical system failed them, South Africans failed them, they deserved better if you believe all men are created equal.

[Tegan Snyman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book broke my heart as most stories in SA do. Harding actually does a really good job of encapsulating and reflecting so many complex aspects of South African conflicts and perspectives of many white South Africans (especially in these sorts of communities). Writing a true story in a narrative form is really compelling and brilliant for empathy.

I’m so fucking angry at how this story ends and the injustice of it all. I’m so frustrated how so little has changed in so many parts of our country. Probably the thing that hit me the hardest was the continuous misidentification and mixup of Simon and Samuel. It’s fucking shameful and speaks to the disregard and dehumanisation of these men, and it bothers me that this wasn’t just the defence who did this but almost everyone throughout the trial.

This type of book should be prescribed reading. But then also we all have to figure out what’s next. It’s not enough to be recognising and discussing systemic racism and economic inequality. There has to be something beyond that.

[Dianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The true story of two young labourers brutally beaten and killed by a gang of young farmers and the resulting trial. The setting is the Orange Free State in South Africa with the background of political tension between black and white, the struggle for land rights and farm killings. It depicts the inadequacies of police, the judiciary and the medical services and the overriding ineffective bureaucracy and complete disregard for individuals.

As a South African I know this area and I know these people. I read the book with horror but with total belief. Half of my genetic material comes from this place and these people yet I could not like them. But they, the farmers, are, and can be warm, friendly and hospitable.

This is a story I cannot forget.

Andrew Harding is the BBC-Africa correspondent and author.

[Claire · Rating 3 out of 5]

***3.5 stars*** There were points where I struggled with this book and points where I was hooked. This non-fiction book is the result of a three year long period of research/investigation around the events in the town of Parys, South Africa, where two black men were killed after an alleged robbery/attack on a white farmer and his property. The crime and the aftermath are explored in detail, including the court process which took years to revsolve and ended up with questionable verdicts. There are a lot of people involved in these events which at times I found confusing (even with the list of characters provided at the start) and that detracted a bit from my enjoyment. However, overall a compelling read and interesting insight into South Africa's troubled past and the tensions of present times.

[Charmaine A · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deeply disturbing and troubling. Living in South Africa is not for the faint hearted - and sadly this book showcases just why it is so unpleasant for everyone from any and every perspective. What a sorry mess it is. And indeed the author captures so many causes and reasons- whilst leaving the reader with so much to wonder about and consider. I’m left with the view that toxic masculinity lies at the root of all this violence, aggression and hatred - which is ignited by fear. Will this country ever heal? Probably not - greedy politicians, rampant incompetence and lawlessness will mitigate against safety, security and justice. Not what one could classify as a happy read with a bright light at the end of a dark tunnel!

[Caleb · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well done true crime book is tough to beat. You find the right events and you get the access to speak with the key players, and it can be riveting. This is such a book. An excellent dive into the murder of two black men in a South African farming town that ends up ensnaring dozens of white farmers and a few policemen. The author does a commendable job trying to hear from all the sides. It's a great snapshot of one town in South Africa and all the many challenges within it. I had a few quibbles--the book needed a map, could have used a primer on the naming convention, and the final chapters felt a little underdone when big revelations were said but not said, but it was an excellent read.