Publisher's Synopsis
The second novel from GG finalist and international award winner Kenneth Bonert, who brought Jewish Johannesburg to explosive life in his debut, The Lion Seeker.
As the 1980s draw to a close, South Africa is a maelstrom of political violence, the apartheid regime in its death throes. is a misfit At an elite private boys' school in Johannesburg, a young Martin Helgeris a mifit, the son of a rough-handed scrap dealer and contemptible little brother of an enigamtic local legend.
When a beautiful and manipulative young American arrives at the family home, Martin soon finds himself wrenched out of his privilieged bubble and thrust into the raw heart of the racial struggle. At the same time, secrets from the
past begin to emerge and old sins, long buried, return in terrifying new ways, tearing at the Helgers, a second-generation Jewish family, even as the larger forces of history and politics tear apart the country. Mercy is in short supply, and ultimately Martin must rely on unlikely strengths to protect himself and fight for a better future.
From the acclaimed author of the awardwinning debut novel The Lion Seeker, The Mandela Plot is at once a riveting literary thriller, a moving coming-of-age tale, and an unforgettable story of a land where power dynamics are constantly shifting--across regimes, races, and classes, and, within this one family, a single human being.
