A great entry into modern African fiction and the apartheid system. Readers can easily draw comparisons between Part One and The Help. ( )

This slim volume of short stories about domestic workers and their ‘medems’ is set in pre-democratic South Africa. I thought it excellent.

A prominent young South African writer talks about ‘listening’ to these stories, rather than reading them, which harks back to the African oral storytelling tradition and is accurate, I think. ( )

This book is a collection of stories divided into two parts. The first part is a ring of connected, gossipy by black South African women working as domestic servants for whites. The pieces, which really highlight the different personalities of each women, and read like oral pieces (if that's possible) are written in first person and are directed to another of the women. I had the distinct feeling I had read these before, but I think the stories are similar to ones I read in '07 in a memoir called Singing Away the Hunger: The Autobiography of an African Woman by Mpho Matsepo Nthunya.

The second part is comprised of several standard short stories set in the 60s through the late 80s, during the Apartheid system in South Africa, at least one story set during some of attempts at reforms in the 80s. The stories are bleak, often tragic, and several were very powerful. There was at least one I would deem "delightful". It was told by a young girl who detailed what her wonderful Fridays were like. This is an important collection, but I could not help but wonder about the stories now. I'm not so naive as to think that the vestiges of such a longtime segregation policy do not linger, but I wondered if the stories now were more hopeful. ( )