It's a Crime!

My South African book club loves crime novels. And they really love the crime novels written by Deon Meyer, one of (if not the) South Africa's most celebrated authors of that genre. I have read a few of Mr. Meyer's 11 published novels and I have to agree, they are a good read. 
 

Deon Meyer writes in Afrikaans and his novels have a true South African sensibility. They are currently translated into more that twenty languages - including English of course - and his books have a large international following. In fact, when I went to listen to the Sunday Times Talk with Michele Magwood on Wednesday night to launch his latest novel Icarus, it was on the eve of Mr. Meyer's promotional book tour through Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. 

wine and cheese reception on the lawns of Kingsmead

The Times Talk was part of the annual Kingsmead Book Fair and was held on the lovely Melrose campus  of  Kingsmead College.

Along with being very good reads and thrilling thrillers, Mr. Meyer's novels retain much of their sense of Akrikaan-ism. He leaves many phrases and idioms untranslated and it is a very effective way to maintain that sense of place in his books. (And just in case you have trouble deducing the translations of the Afrikaans from their place in the sentence or paragraph, he does include a glossary in the back to help!) Mr. Meyer was born in Paarl, grew up in Klerksdorp in the gold mining region of Northwest Province, and currently lives in Stellenbosch.

Icarus is set in and around Cape Town and the Cape Winelands and involves the hit on the South African developer of the notorious Alibi smartphone application which supplies real-time alibis for philanderers and cheating spouses. Sounds intriguing!