Friday, May 6, 2011

Zimbabwe's latest thriller novel!


This is a thriller in 13 chapters by new author, Violet Masilo and published by the Zimbabwe Women Writers.It is highly engaging!It is written in a simple and at times earthy language that you will be able to identify with. The text explores the lives of four city girls of the fast lane;Anne, Heather, Joylee and Catherine. Thy often meet at the Tea Cosy, a place famed for its drinks and the music. The place also has got a cosmopolitan hue where people of different races and the ‘yuppie’are found. From the Tea Cosy, we tend to get the lives of the four ladies through their thought patterns, in the fashion of a stream of consciousness that is individualistic. The individualistic voices then pour onto a communal voice. Never mind my use of ‘communal’ in this regard because there is a lot of subversion, intrigue, individualistic cunning and craftiness.

At the centre of the narrative is a case of culpable homicide. Steve is killed by Heather and Catherine. In the documentation of this crime we tend to get resonates of Sigmund Freud’s theory.In this case Catherine is quick to get into a rage of fury due to an attempted rape suffered at a tender age. Also, Steve had been sodomised by a Nigerian neighbor in Europe and in return he vents vengeance on the society starting with sexually abusing Mrs Gwen’s daughter in Europe.Still related to crime, Steve becomes a drug addict and together with Farai they dabble in cocaine, etc. It also takes the esoteric gift of Ma Sibanda to point directly to Joylee that she aborted three times in her life. This is a sick society. Corruption is captured from the level of the individual and this in turn corrodes the society.Each of these women here has great style. She knows how to reward a good man. She knows how to take down a brute and more important, how to move on into the setting sun, in search of love, treasure, trust and fulfilment.(Taken from Edwin Mhandu's review)
++For orders Tel:00263712525228 email:bwpzim@yahoo.com

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