Latest Titles
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LOST GROUND
Fiction (Literary Fiction) 312 pages
Jonathan Ball (South Africa) - March 14, 2011
'Superbly crafted and compelling portrayal of loss and discovery. Heyns writes with absolute honesty, exploring the human condition with deep compassion and wit.' -- Andrew Brown
"Whether you read it as a whodunnit or as a portrait of the nation, LOST GROUND is utterly compelling - exquisitely written, profound, hilarious and hauntingly familiar." -- Finuala Dowling
"So much more than just great storytelling. It is Heyns' mastery of language, his wonderful sense of place, and deftly drawn characters that make this book superlative. I loved it." -- Deon Meyer
Peter, a freelance writer in London, returns to his South African home town for the first time in years, after the brutal murder of his beautiful cousin, in search of a career-defining story. Desirée had already caused a stir when she married ANC soldier turned policeman, Hector Williams, in the town’s first mixed-race marriage, and with Hector now in jail as key suspect, Peter is teasing out Othello-like themes of murderous jealousy even before he arrives. But soon he has to question his assumptions and realise how little he knows about his much-changed country, perhaps how little he knew before he left. In search of Desirée’s story, he now starts to rewrite his own – till events take an even more shocking turn… -
THE CHILDREN'S DAY
Fiction (Literary Fiction) 244 pages
Tin House - May 2009
‘Eminently readable… reminiscent in structure and tone to Vikas Swarup’s “Q&A”… funny, surprising and disturbing.'
-- San Diego Union-Tribune
‘Fascinating… Mr Heyns’ novel deserves a wide readership.’
-- Wall Street Journal
A memorable first novel sensitively evoking a young South African boy’s rite of passage, in the spirit of THE GO-BETWEEN.
Simon observes a series of newcomers to his small home town and gradually pieces together truths about love, life, politics and sex: realisations which crystallize as a result of a disturbing encounter at the novel’s climax. -
THE TYPEWRITER'S TALE
Fiction (Literary Fiction) 233 pages
Jonathan Ball (South Africa) - November 2005
Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize Africa Region 2006
Shortlisted for the Herman Charles Bosman Prize in South Africa
Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize
‘A winningly persuasive and entertaining account … Heyns is an extraordinary wordsmith…what impressed me was how seamlessly James’s words segue with Heyns’s own.’ -- Sunday Independent
The novel centres on the fictional character of James’s typist, Frieda Wroth, caught up in the friendships and rivalries at James’s house in Rye, in particular the affair between the charming American Morton Fullerton, and the novelist Edith Wharton. Thought-provoking and slyly witty, probing questions of love and art, and the nature of a life fully lived.
Biography
Professor Emeritus in English, Stellenbosch University. Author of numerous academic works and radio adaptations of Henry James' and Elizabeth Gaskell's novels. Author of BODIES POLITIC (Jonathan Ball 2008); THE TYPEWRITER'S TALE (Jonathan Ball 2006, Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize); THE RELUCTANT PASSENGER (Jonathan Ball 2003, France: Lattes, 2007); THE CHILDREN'S DAY (Jonathan Ball 2002; US: Tin House) and translator of Marlene van Niekerk's multiple award-winning THE WAY OF THE WOMEN (which was also shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize). Writing the chapter on James for the forthcoming Cambridge Companion to English Novelists. Winner of the Thomas Pringle Award for journalism 2007 and the Sol Plaatje award for translation, 2008.
Shortlisted for University of Johannesburg Main Prize 2008/9.
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