Last year Tshidiso Moletsane won the fiction prize for his novel Junx, and this year, we have thirteen books on the longlist of this prestigious literary award.
Have a look at which of our books have made the list, and get a sneak peek into each of them with extracts.
FICTION
“This is the 22nd year of the Sunday Times fiction prize. The criteria stipulate that the winning novel should be one of ‘rare imagination and style ... a tale so compelling as to become an enduring landmark of contemporary fiction’.” – Sunday Times
The Heist Men
Andrew Brown
In this explosive crime thriller, Andrew Brown pits his haunted detective against the most elusive enemy he has yet faced. While dealing with his own demons, problems with his ex-wife and daughter, and a colonel with a history in the apartheid police force, Eberard moves ever closer to a dramatic showdown.
How to be a Revolutionary
CA Davids
A reluctant friendship develops between two people in an apartment block in Shanghai. Each has a secret, a hidden past that must not intrude upon the present. How To Be a Revolutionary is a bold, daring and poignant exploration of what we owe our countries, ourselves and those we love.
Stirring the Pot
Quraisha Dawood
A glimpse into the private lives of a group of women in Durban’s Muslim community. Prepare for a wedding, a theft, Ramadaan, and a passing, while delicious recipes for traditional cuisine add local spice to life at Summer Terrace.
Two Tons o’ Fun
Fred Khumalo
A charming novel set in a Johannesburg township. Rich and humorous, this vibrant coming-of-age story sees a young woman uncover her skill as a writer, explore her sexuality, travel, and finally understand her mother.
Notes on Falling
Bronwyn Law Viljoen
Notes on Falling is about the hope that art will challenge perceptions and orthodoxy so that the world can be reinvented through new forms. It is also about trying to reconcile the large pictures of history with the small snapshots of our individual lives.
READ AN EXTRACT from the 2022 Sunday Times Literary Award winner for fiction, JUNX >>
The Second Verse
Onke Mazibuko
Bokang just wants to rap, sketch and be left alone. Everyone keeps yacking on about Bokang reaching his true potential but everyone keeps getting in the way. So what happens? Boy meets girl. It wouldn’t be much of a story otherwise.
Across the Kala Pani
Shelvyn Mottai
The epic stories of Indian immigrants – the brave, the bold, the kind; the weak, the cruel, the cowardly – are woven into the fabric of South Africa’s Indian population today. Shevlyn Mottai has drawn on her ancestors’ history to highlight the bonds formed between women during adversity, and to celebrate their journeys of tragedy and triumph.
The Quality of Mercy
Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu
Following on her award-winning novels The Theory of Flight and The History of Man, Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu’s The Quality of Mercy is a novel of comfort and, indeed, mercy. Ndlovu weaves together elements of social comedy and cosy crime while examining the history of a country transitioning from a colonial to a postcolonial state.
Hammerman: A Walking Shadow
Mike Nicol
Children find a body in the Strandfontein sand dunes. A populist politician is gunned down outside parliament. His number two executed in bed with a high-class escort. A cabinet minister shot leaving a security estate. A cop assassinated in his car. Another in his beach house. And it all ties back to the murder of Swedish prime minister Olof Palme in 1986 – as private investigator Fish Pescado is about to discover.
The Errors of Dr Browne
Mark Winkler
When Doctor Thomas Browne accepts the role of both inquisitor and witness in one of England’s last witch trials, he embarks on what his biographer later calls ‘the most culpable and stupid action of his life’.Mark Winkler’s novel is a wry and insightful glimpse into the limits of reason, the patriarchal need to control every aspect of womanhood, and our ongoing preoccupation with reputation.
NON-FICTION
“This year marks the 33rd anniversary of the non-fiction. The award will be bestowed on a book that presents ‘the illumination of truthfulness, especially those forms of it that are new, delicate, unfashionable and fly in the face of power’, and that demonstrates ‘compassion, elegance of writing, and intellectual and moral integrity’.” – Sunday Times
Mr Entertainment: The Life of Taliep Petersen
Paula Fourie
In Mr Entertainment, we hear the voices of the people who knew Taliep Petersen best: his family, friends and collaborators. Drawing on the musician’s personal archive and on more than fifty interviews conducted over a decade, Paula Fourie has pieced together a fascinating portrait of Taliep Petersen, acutely observed and poignantly captured.
Dear Comrade President: Oliver Tambo and the Foundations of South Africa’s Constitution
Andre Odendaal and Albie Sachs
In his annual presidential address on 8 January 1986, ANC president Oliver Tambo called on South Africans to make apartheid ungovernable through militant action. But unknown to the world, the quiet-spoken mathematics teacher and aspirant priest turned reluctant revolutionary had also on that very day set up a secret think tank in Lusaka, which he named the Constitution Committee, giving it an ‘ad hoc unique exercise’ that had ‘no precedent in the history of the movement’.
Guns and Needles: A Journey into the heart of South African Sport’s Steroid and Drug Culture
Clinton Van den Berg
Guns and Needles infiltrates an extraordinary environment that includes the story of the youngest athlete, who happens to be a South African, to ever test positive. With doping numbers far higher than the international average, prominent sportswriter Clinton van der Berg probes why this is so. Guns and Needles is a gripping read filled with drama, tragedy and scarcely believable stories.
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Extract: Decima by Eben Venter