Musings of a South African Bookworm

This list is compiled by Exclusive Books and is the top 110 bestselling books of 2008.

I found it extremely interesting to see how different this list was compared to the Borders book list. (The ones in bold are the ones that I have read and I get a grand total of 18 and a half!).

Have a look and see how many you get on this one…

1. Eat, Pray, Love – Elizabeth Gilbert
2. A New Earth – Eckhart Tolle
3. The Secret – Rhonda Byrne
4. The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari – Robin Sharma
5. Spud – John van de Ruit
6. The Shack – William P. Young
7. The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
8. In Black and White: The Jake White Story – Jake White, Craig Ray
9. Shantaram – Gregory David Roberts
10. After the Party – Andrew Feinstein
11. Don’t Panic – Alan Knott-Craig
12. Pirates of Polokwane – Zapiro
13. Spud: The Madness Continues – John van de Ruit
14. The Tales of Beedle the Bard – J.K. Rowling
15. Dinner with Mugabe – Heidi Holland
16. Breaking Dawn – Stephenie Meyer
17. A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini
18. Playing the Enemy – John Carlin
19. The Book Thief – Markus Zusak
20. The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho
21. Some of My Best Friends are White – Ndumiso Ngcobo
22. Twilight – Stephenie Meyer
23. This Charming Man – Marian Keyes
24. Brisingr – Christopher Paolini
25. The Exclusive Books Children’s Best Books Guide
26. Screw It, Let’s Do It – Richard Branson
27. Socrates and the Fox – Clem Sunter, Chantell Ilbury
28. New Moon – Stephenie Meyer
29. The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life – Alice Schroeder
30. Who Moved My Cheese? – Spencer Johnson
31. Capitalist Nigger – Chika A. Onyeani
32. A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini
33. The Pillars of the Earth – Ken Follett
34. The Last Lecture – Randy Pausch
35. Monty – Mark Keohane
36. A Prisoner of Birth – Jeffrey Archer
37. The Power of Now – Eckhart Tolle
38. Zhoozsh – Jeremy Mansfield, Jacqui Mansfield
39. Dreams from My Father – Barack Obama
40. The Audacity of Hope – Barack Obama
41. In a Different Time – Peter Harris
42. Is it Just Me or is Everything Kak? – Tim Richman, Grant Schreiber
43. Freakonomics – Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner
44. 13 uur – Deon Meyer
45. Platter’s South African Wines 2009
46. Brida – Paulo Coelho
47. Of Tricksters, Tyrants and Turncoats – Max du Preez
48. There are Ants in My Sugar – Annica Foxcroft
49. Jamie’s Ministry of Food – Jamie Oliver
50. Rich Dad, Poor Dad – Robert Kiyosaki
51. Platter’s South African Wines 2008
52. Escape – Carolyn Jessop
53. Around Africa on My Bicycle – Riaan Manser
54. To the Brink: The State of Democracy in South Africa – Xolela Mangcu
55. Eclipse – Stephenie Meyer
56. Guinness World Records 2009 –
57. Dark Continent My Black Arse – Sihle Khumalo
58. Stealing Water – Tim Ecott
59. Three Letter Plague – Jonny Steinberg  (read halfway)
60. Madam and Eve Unplugged – Stephen Francis, Rico
61. Now, Discover Your Strengths – Marcus Buckingham
62. Business Stripped Bare – Richard Branson
63. A Short History of Nearly Everything – Bill Bryson
64. Think Big and Kick Ass – Donald Trump
65. Tuesdays with Morrie – Mitch Albom
66. Zuma – Jeremy Gordin
67. Change of Heart – Jodi Picoult
68. Mense van my asem – Steve Hofmeyr
69. A Long Walk to Freedom – Nelson Mandela
70. The Quest – Wilbur Smith
71. Karma Suture – Rosamund Kendal
72. Optimum Nutrition Made Easy – Patrick Holford
73. Laying Ghosts to Rest – Mamphela Ramphele
74. The Jews in South Africa: An Illustrated History – Richard Mendelsohn, Milton Shain
75. 7th Heaven – James Patterson
76. Confessions of an Economic Hit Man – John Perkins
77. Roberts Bird Guide – Hugh Chittenden, Guy Upfold
78. Op die agterpaaie – Dana Snyman
79. For Crying Out Loud – Jeremy Clarkson
80. The Arms Deal in Your Pocket – Paul Holden
81. Q and A – Vikas Swarup
82. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen R. Covey
83. Things I Want My Daughter to Know – Elizabeth Noble
84. The Five Love Languages – Gary Chapman
85. The State of Africa – Martin Meredith
86. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – Stieg Larsson
87. The Race – Richard North Patterson
88. The Tipping Point – Malcolm Gladwell
89. A Most Wanted Man – John le Carre
90. Atonement – Ian McEwan
91. The Art of Possibility – Rosamund Stone Zander, Benjamin Zander
92. Sail – James Patterson
93. The Voluptuous Delights of Peanut Butter and Jam – Lauren Liebenberg
94. Broken Window – Jeffery Deaver
95. The Whole Truth – David Baldacci
96. When a Crocodile Eats the Sun – Peter Godwin
97. The White Tiger – Aravind Adiga
98. Good to Great – Jim Collins
99. The Appeal – John Grisham
100. Meals in Minutes – Sharon Glass
101. Thabo Mbeki: The Dream Deferred – Mark Gevisser
102. Night Train to Lisbon – Pascal Mercier
103. The Private Patient – P.D. James
104. Compulsion – Jonathan Kellerman
105. Outliers – Malcolm Gladwell
106. Choice, Not Fate – Pippa Green
107. Scarpetta – Patricia Cornwell
108. Cross Country – James Patterson
109. The Appeal – John Grisham
110. The Persimmon Tree – Bryce Courtenay

The Reluctant Passenger is a fabulous book. I discovered it a few years ago and was completely taken with it, I immediately went off to find if he had written anything else, which as we all know, he has! And thank goodness for that, else where would we, as readers be?

The book is set in Cape Town and that was one of the reasons why I enjoyed it so much. I could identify with the place, and there is something wonderful about reading a book where you know the places contained within its covers. It is also a somewhat quirky book with interesting characters and a fabulous story line. I am not one to give away the story line so will leave you with the extract from the back of the book to tempt you to read it.

‘Nicholas Morris is a fundamentally decent chap who likes order, and isn’t given to messy emotions. He and his ‘sort of’ girlfriend Leonora share a relationship that is comforting in its sameness, and he is ensconced in a well-paid career as an environmental lawyer.

Apart from his frustration with the madness of Cape Town’s traffic, he is not aware of feeling any dissatisfaction with his lot. But then, he’s not aware of feeling very much at all really. Until he realises he’s forgotten to vote in South Africa’s first democratic elections – because he was seeing to the long-overdue mowing of his lawn. With a jolt Nicholas begins to wonder if he isn’t being squeezed to the margins of his own dull life, despite all the efforts of his flamboyantly gay colleague Gerhard, who constantly tries to provoke him to let go and live a little.

But soon Nicholas has no choice. When he takes on a case to save the baboons of Cape Point from developers, he becomes drawn into intrigues involving a charismatic liberal judge, dinosaurs of the old regime and the full cast of the wealthy Tomlinson family, not to mention its golden boy heir.

When the baboons are captured for experimentation by a research institute from the Old South Africa, which has somehow become incorporated into the New, he finds himself acting with uncharacteristic passion and conviction. Sucked into a whirlpool of deceit, he finds a lot more going on below the surface than he’d ever imagined – and soon he is not only struggling with his own identity, but fighting for his life.‘

Michiel Heyns writes with great intelligence and humour, starting from page one and it doesnt stop there. This novel provides entertainment and food for thought and I would recommend anyone who has/does or will live in Cape Town to read it, as well as those who have never set foot inside our country.

And just to tempt you just a little bit more (and any one who has been stuck in the Cape Town traffic):

‘Between my orderly house in Pinelands and my orderly office in the city, I had to negotiate Settler’s Way, a three-lane highway clogged with every neurosis, addiction, psychosis, obsession, phobia, mania and perversion known to science and a few yet to be classified, amongst the latter being a form of demonic possession visited upon minibus taxis, manifesting itself as a compulsion to hop kerbs, push into lanes that are already crowded beyond capacity, reverse into the face of oncoming traffic, make u-turns in the fast lane, and shed wheels and bumpers at random, all the while hooting indignantly at everything obstructing or deemed remotely likely to obstruct their frenzied progress.’

And just to satisfy those reading tastebuds, The Book Club Blog is having a giveaway of this novel. Yes, you read that sentence correctly! All that is required is that you leave a comment with your details and one reason why you should be the person who receives this book.

The giveaway is open to all residents in South Africa and the closing date will be the 5 November 2009.  We will then contact the lucky reader and get the book into the post for you.

Now, hows that for a great start to the weekend?

Happy Friday and happy reading!

First up, I hope that you all enjoyed reading our interview with Michiel Heyns, I have to admit that I enjoyed doing the interview greatly. I felt very honoured that our blog was the platform for his interview and I do hope that we have brought you a ‘new’ author to discover.

As for more interviews, we have several in the pipeline, so please do keep checking back, you will not be dissapointed!

Which brings me to my point:

We need you! We would love to know who you would like to have interviewed on The Book Club Blog. Who would you like to know just a little bit better, why they wrote a particular novel? Which author has blown your skirt up and you have to read everything they ever wrote? Which author wrote something that changed your way of thinking, of relating to the world as you know it?

What we would like you to do, is head on down to the comments section and let us know. Let us know, if you could interview any author, who would it be and what would your question/s be?

This is a book club and there is more than one reader, so let us know, you never know, your questions may just be answered!

We look forward to hearing from you.

I received this email today from Exclusive Books and I thought i would share it with you.  As you know I have read this book and thoroughly enjoyed it (I must have excellent taste in books then one would presume???)

“Kathryn Stockett’s novel, The Help, swept the boards at the 2009 Exclusive Books Boeke Prize Awards.

The awards were the culmination of a six week competition in which top book reviewers and Exclusive Books Fanatics members were asked to read the following six shortlisted titles and to then vote for their favourite reads:

1. The Help, Kathryn Stockett
2. Testimony, Anita Shreve
3. The Angel’s Game, Carlos Ruiz Zafon
4. People of the Book, Geraldine Brooks
5. The Children’s Book, A.S Byatt
6. The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet, Reif Larsen

The Help stole Fanatics and journalists’ hearts, scooping first place by a large margin of over 40% of the votes, followed by The Angel’s Game, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon and The Children’s Book, by A.S Byatt in third place.

SPECIAL OFFER TO FANATICS MEMBERS

To celebrate the winner of the 2009 Boeke Award, Fanatics members will earn 350 bonus points when you purchase The Help until 18th October.

The Help is set in 1960’s Jackson, Mississippi, a place where lines are clearly drawn and never crossed. A place where black women, like wise Aibileen and sassy Minny, raise white babies and cook in kitchens while white madams play bridge or belong to the Junior League where bossy bullies, like Hilly, rule the roost. It is a place where black women have no voice and where the likes of Hilly decide who is allowed into society circles and who should be snubbed. But Jackson is also a place where things are starting to change…

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women–mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends–view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the rules by which we abide, and those we don’t.

“Kathryn Stockett’s ‘The Help’ has significant resonance for those brought up in SA, often spending a great deal of time being brought up by black ‘nannies’ or ‘help’. The complex and complicated relationships between these women, their employers and their charges are skilfully drawn and the many issues that emerge are dealt with courageously” – Fiona Ramsay

“The Help features a moving examination of themes most South Africans are only too familiar with.” – Bruce Dennill, The Citizen

About the Author

Kathryn Stockett was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. After graduating from the University of Alabama, she moved to New York City, where she worked in magazine publishing and marketing for nine years. She currently lives in Atlanta with her husband and daughter. The Help is Kathryn’s first novel and is garnering the most amazing reviews from around the world.”

I really do urge you to add this book to your collection!