Brynard once again proves that her
contribution to South African writing is the thinking person’s crime novel.
(Review by Margaret von Klemperer, courtesy of The Witness)
Originally published in Afrikaans as
Tuisland, Homeland comes with a
weight of expectation. Karin Brynard’s previous crime novels (Weeping Waters and Our Fathers) were superb and her main character, Captain Albertus
Beeslaar, is an endearing if grumpy hero.
At the opening of Homeland (translated by Linde Dietrich), Beeslaar has made the
momentous decision to quit the police, move back to Johannesburg to be with
Gerda and his infant daughter and take a better paid job with a security
company. But his boss General Mogale, who is even grumpier than Beeslaar, has
one final job for him in the Kalahari: allegations of police brutality are
being made after an elder in the San community was found dead shortly after his
release from custody, and there is about to be a big political rally in the
area. Things are sensitive and need speedy handling, not least to silence the
whispers of witchcraft that are spreading.
As always with Brynard, there are other
strands to the story. In a smart lodge, one of the staff sees a German tourist
interfering with a small, silent local child, and does the only thing she can
think of to stop him – she hits him, hard. Afraid he is dead, she takes the
child and goes on the run. And then the German’s body goes missing. Mogale
dispatches Colonel Koeskoes Mentoor to deal with that case.
Next, the policeman Beeslaar is
investigating for brutality gets himself killed. Mentoor, who had what she
hoped was a secret affair with the dead man, is convinced she knows the
identity of the killer, but Beeslaar is less sure. Theirs is not going to be a
relationship made in heaven and Mentoor has no inhibitions about pulling rank
and doesn’t take well to criticism.
Brynard is skilled at putting her finger on
issues of importance. Here she plunges the reader into matters of race, land,
history, crooked policemen and the curious anomaly that is the town of Orania.
She highlights the divisions within the San community over land – which groups
want it for what reasons – and their culture and its appropriation by both
locals and foreigners for profit which seems unlikely to filter back to the
community.
There is humour, tragedy and action in this
complex and lengthy novel. Characters are properly fleshed out, and engage the
readers’ sympathies, even when we can see their flaws. Brynard once again
proves that her contribution to South African writing is the thinking person’s
crime novel. Long may she continue to provide it. - Margaret von Klemperer
Homeland is published by Penguin Books - ISBN 978-1-4152-0694-2
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