Compilation of Holomisa's newspaper columns from BUSINESS DAY and THE NATAL WITNESS, which discuss the state of customs and traditions in contemporary South Africa and the challenges facing traditional leaders in tackling issues of social disintegration and national identity. 210pp, SOUTH AFRICA. AFRICAN MINDS.

In 2003, David Smiedt began a journey of discovery around South Africa. As a child his parents had taken him on endless car journeys to teach him the history of their country and tell him about his relatives and the places they had inhabited. 30 years later, he sets out to retrace those journeys but it soon turns into a love letter to his native country and an insight into the country's people describing how they have been shaped over the years by politics and migrants. 320pp, UK. EBURY.

Combining travel and historical narratives, the author relates his 1400 kilometre canoeing trip through the landscape carved by the Orange River. He describes the lives of the people who live on the borders of African and European tradition, and tells the story of people struggling to maintain their identity such as the San, the Nama, the Griqua and the Basters. Sources, 287pp, SOUTH AFRICA. KWELA BOOKS, 0795701896

This book chronicles an epic journey through the Karoo on an old motorbike. It features Karoo-based adventure-motor biking articles - with colour photographs. A map, shows actual distances covered during the author's journey. 315pp, SOUTH AFRICA. SPRINGBOK PRESS.

Covers seven South African regions in full colour photographs. Interwoven in Gwynne's culinary wanderings and anecdotes of people and places, are reviews of accommodation and restaurants of the area, as well as easy to follow maps. Gwynne has an eye and ear for the idiosyncratic and the quirky. In her quest for great cuisine, she uncovers the eccentricities of the people who live and cook in the countryside. We discover how Mpumalanga's Robbers' Pass got its name; how the creative writing process imposes on cooking; why writer/artist Braam Kruger is more famous for his perfect fish and chips than for his art and possibly most importantly, how to mix the perfect Bloody Mary or Martini. Gloss, 222pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JACANA MEDIA.

A collection of stories reflecting idiosyncratic reactions to living and working in Johannesburg. xii, 258p, SOUTH AFRICA. PENGUIN BOOKS SOUTH AFRICA, 0143024191

A collection of non-fiction stories from South Africa's pre-eminent authors, journalists and commentators, covering diverse subjects such as corruption in the countryside, sexual abuse, 'Zuluness' in time of Zuma, and ethnic panic. Contributors include: Mondli Makhanya, Jacob Dlamini, Michael Titlestad, Sarah Nuttall, Deborah Posel, Archille Mbembe, Liz McGregor, Imraan Coovadia and Ferial Haffajee. 248pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JONATHAN BALL.

In 1956 seven amateur adventurers set off from Natal in a decrepit 5-ton truck named Kalahari Polka', on the craziest expedition ever to enter the unknown. Its goal: to make archaeological history by locating a mythical Lost City in a remote range of mountains deep in the Kalahari Desert. Included in the party was Paton, acclaimed author of ‘Cry, the Beloved Country’, chairman of the newly-formed South African Liberal Party and a leading political voice of his time. This is the hitherto unpublished account of the odd adventure. Recounted with dry, self-deprecating wit and supplemented by hand-drawn maps, provisions lists, photographs, 8mm film stills and other fascinating memorabilia from the period, this entertaining travelogue brings to life the quirky cast of characters, rough discomforts of the journey, tedium of unvarying landscape, vast desert vistas, and encounters with wild Bushmen and other Kalahari people. Col & b/w photos, 58pp, SOUTH AFRICA. UNIVERSITY OF KWAZULU-NATAL PRESS.

Story of a journey from Cape Town to the Northern Cape and back to visit some world-class Stone Age archaeological sites. In the tradition of writers such as Barry Lopez, W.G. Sebald, Gary Snyder and Bruce Chatwin, this travel memoir combines extensive research with personal narrative to explore how a particular woman's experience raises questions that are political, ecological, and philosophical. 269pp, SOUTH AFRICA. KWELA BOOKS.

In this selection of his BUSINESS DAY columns, Steinberg has an eye for the strangeness of a fractured country: walks through Pollsmoor Prison on the eve of the invasion of Iraq and believes he sees in the jails corridors why the impending war in the Middle East will fail. He meets a poverty-stricken old man who spends most of his state pension maintaining a black Mercedes Benz, and explains why this shows that governments welfare programme is working. He tells us why he thinks Thabo Mbeki is an Afro-pessimist and why a South Africa ruled by Tokyo Sexwale would be as riddled with corruption as Silvio Berlusconi’s Italy. 327pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JONATHAN BALL.

In dialogue with the dead and living - Nelson Mandela, Mahmoud Darwish, Barack Obama - Breyten Breytenbach's new collection of essays traces the collisions between utopia and disaster, political traumas and the renewal of hope. 220pp, USA. HAYMARKET BOOKS.

A collection of more colourful, fascinating and mostly unknown characters, spanning more than three hundred years of South African history including the story of the Foster gang of Johannesburg, who were indirectly responsible for the killing of Boer hero Koos de la Rey; the tale of David Pratt, the man who shot Hendrik Verwoerd in the head at the Rand Easter Show; the account of three men who pulled off the biggest jewellery heist of the time, stealing Bridget Oppenheimer’s jewellery in 1956; and the sensational and previously unknown story of how a right-wing attack using small aeroplanes at Nelson Mandela's inauguration in 1994 was thwarted at the last moment. 272pp, SOUTH AFRICA. STRUIK.

A personal account of a Peace Corps volunteer's experiences in Lochiel, a South African town near the Swaziland border. He describes his experiences of modern South Africa, the distance between black and white lifestyles and his commitment the people who adopt him as one of their own. Illustrated with colour photographs. Map, xvi, 278pp, USA. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY.

From the stillness of the Karoo savanna to the warmth of the Indian Ocean, and from the exclusive white neighbourhoods of Pretoria to the destitution of the black townships in Cape Town, John Malathronas chronicles a journey across one of the most beautiful countries on Earth. Packed with pen portraits of the many Afrikaner, Xhosa, Zulu, Indian and Swazi characters he encounters, all of whom make up the tapestry of the new South Africa. 340pp, UK. SUMMERSDALE.

Collection of the best of his writings that have appeared in the likes 'The New Yorker', 'Rolling Stone' and 'Esquire'. Crisscrossing South Africa and further afield in a quest to understand the land and continent of his birth, Malan does time with an extraordinary cast of characters: from vigilantes and outlaws to beauty queens and truckers; from Sol Kerzner to Jackie Selebi; from JM Coetzee to the last Afrikaner in Tanzania. 380pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JONATHAN BALL.

Tells the stories of South Africans (and visitors) who have chosen to reclaim the streets from predators and traffic. While the focus is primarily on Johannesburg, several of the stories are about Cape Town, contrasting the experience of walking in these two cities. Other international cities such as Los Angeles, Paris, London and Mumbai are also visited along the way. 384pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JACANA.

Less than a decade after the advent of democracy in South Africa, tabloid newspapers have taken the country by storm. One of these papers - the Daily Sun - is now the largest in the country, but it has generated controversy for its perceived lack of respect for privacy, brazen sexual content, and unre-strained truth stretching. Herman Wasserman takes a close look at the success of tabloid journalism in South Africa at a time when global print media are in decline. He considers the social significance of the tabloids in South Africa and how they play a role in integrating readers and their daily struggles with the political and social sphere of the new democracy. 240pp, USA. INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS.

A selection of Paul Weinberg's best work over twenty five years, from late 1970s Jo'burg to contemporary rural South Africa. Foreword by Guy Berger. 109pp, SOUTH AFRICA. UNIVERSITY OF KWAZULU NATAL PRESS.

City boy Deon Maas flees the suburbs in search of adventure and Africa is where he reckons he will find it. Over a period of 15 years he embarks on several journeys, once with his whole family in tow, to discover what it means to be African. He ends up ducking pirates in Madagascar, spending a night with oil thieves in Nigeria and narrowly escaping death at a roadblock in the Congo. Interwoven with his travel stories is his search for local music and the musical legends of the countries he visits. 224pp, SOUTH AFRICA. KWELA BOOKS.

Tales of some of Africa's more colourful characters from pieces originally published in GETAWAY magazine. 304pp, SOUTH AFRICA. JACANA MEDIA.