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Article: Under the Gun in South Africa
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- September 21, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2009 The Washington Post. This material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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BLOOD SAFARI
By Deon Meyer
Translated from Afrikaans by K.L. Seegers
Atlantic Monthly. 374 pp. $19.95Often, the best fiction doesn't
take us back to our unhappy childhoods or our depressing home towns
but into new worlds we've not known before. Deon Meyer's novels
explore the complex reality of South Africa, a world little known to
many of us. At the most obvious level, they are exciting stories of
crime, conflict and revenge, but they are more than that: ambitious
attempts to show us the pain and greatness of a troubled nation that
is still being born.
This novel's protagonist, Lemmer, is an Afrikaner, a white South
African whose ancestors came to the region from Europe three
centuries ...