ZEBRA CROSSING

A little gem of a novel - a poignant and slightly shocking story which deepens our understanding of the prevailing political situation in Zimbabwe and South Africa as well as illuminating the vagaries of human character. It is also a story of teenage love and of family betrayal, the most heart-breaking kind.

Two young Africans, Chipo and her older brother, George, flee poverty and turmoil in Zimbabwe after the death of her mother to follow a dream of a better life in Cape Town. They miraculously make it across the border and, despite being illegal immigrants, manage to find a place to live and get work, helped by twin brothers David and Peter, who came from the same village back home, and who couldn’t be more different (homosexual one and a womanizer the other).

But Chipo is special in more than one way: she is a black albino, which arouses curiosity, fear or worse in equal measure, in most people she meets. Thought to have magical powers by some, to be a witch, a curse or a business opportunity to be exploited by others, she is only a teenage girl falling in love for the first time and hanging on to the memory and encouraging words of her beloved mother. Set in the months before and during the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, it gives us a vivid and tragic picture of the fear, violence, unrest and hopes that the football competition caused, bringing out the best and worst of human nature.

Meg Vandermerwe is the author of a collection of stories, This Place I Call Home, published by Modjaji Books, South Africa, 2010. She has an MA in Creative Writing from UEA. This novel is part of her Ph.D. in Creative Writing at the University of Lancaster. Meg is also a Lecturer in Creative Writing and English Literature at the University of the Western Cape. She is now working on her second novel.