Alive Again

This contemporary youth novel, written in a first person retrospective narrative style, shares with the reader the story of the highly intelligent and very beautiful Nandile Dube, who – from an early age – hopes to be an “honest human rights lawyer to make sure helpless people get treated fairly and with respect”. Her long-suffering mother fully supports Nandi’s dream, to the extent of working double shifts to pay Nandi’s school fees at a former Model C school. Mrs Dube constantly encourages Nandi to make use of every chance to attain her dream. Nandi’s father, however, holds the patriarchal view that education is wasted on a girl and that women serve no other purpose in society than “to cook, clean, please their husbands” and bear children. The stage is then set for a story that grips the reader from the very first paragraph. Will the courageous Nandi and her support team of “Earth Angels” help her to hold on to her dream of becoming a lawyer, or will her sexist father and his ilk trample on Nandi and disrespect her dreams?