Meet Katherine Barnard, a white lesbian PI in today's dynamic and dangerous South Africa.
"So was it the sneezing that rang the alarm bells or was it those legs or the incongruity of the cowboy boots with the rest of her outfit or was it seeing a stranger in the middle of the day in Kleinstad? Maybe it just my natural curiosity that made me decide to follow her."
"Well, the "following" thing is a long story--a family saga--that is very boring, but the gist of it is that we are a following kind of people. Like some people drum it into their kids' heads that they are winners? We are followers. I sort of understood from my father that his family was indoctrinated with the "Never leaders, always followers" credo. I grew up with this dismal fact of life, knowing I was destined for followingness, until that cold winter day about four years ago when I realized that I could create my own destiny and turn the following thing into a career--so I became a PI."
"Kleinstad, the town of my birth, (roughly translated as Little City) is not really a place one drives through--one drives to it, well some people do. And I wondered as I walked on the familiar cracked pavement with the weeds growing through the cracks, what the hell brought her here."
Vivian Amory lives in Durban, South Africa, and writes political speeches for a living. This is her first novel.
