We have wonderful role models to look up to - from the truth sayers, Thuli Madonsela and journalists like Ferial Haffajee to visual artists like Zanele Muholi and Mary Sibande. In the corporate as well as government world, you hear a lot of tinkling glass as they're ascending through the glass ceiling.

Our BEEE-rules and the labour laws, among other things, have secured women’s representation in the work place to a very large degree. But for some it has changed dramatically in the past 25 years or so. Life is still hard for the majority of women in this country, yes. On some levels women have never had it so good. Now’s the time to catch up with the previous two books in the series: Recipes for Love and Murder, and Tannie Maria and the Satanic Mechanic.ġ. This is book three in the feel-good, funny, Karoo-based mystery series, infused with food and nature, with layers of political and psychological healing. This book takes you on a soul-searching and very entertaining journey through a number of alternative healing approaches, to overcome addiction and address the existential question of ‘Why we are here?’ I related to it since I went on a similar quest to conquer my own chronic illness.ĭeath on the Limpopo: A Tannie Maria Mystery by Sally Andrew (Umuzi, 2019, due out September). Self-Helpless: A Cynic’s Search for Sanity by Rebecca Davis (Pan Macmillan, 2018). Tshabalala bravely marches into herds of sacred cows that others tip-toe around.

These refreshing and engaging essays will get you thinking, laughing and talking about race, sex, gender and culture in South Africa today. The Way I See It: The Musings of a Black Woman in a Rainbow Nation by Lerato Tshabalala (PRHSA, 2016). These are three books I love because they have heart and brains and make me laugh out loud:

My Father's Orchid by Rayda Jacobs