Sun on Your Back

About the book

About Sun on Your Back

‘Dad’s dead Dee. Mum said she killed him.’Diara Kruger is woken on a freezing October morning in London by the shrill sound of her telephone. The caller is her older sister Shaan who lives with the rest of her family in Zimbabwe. A very obviously distressed Shaan informs her that their father, Andre is dead and their mother Sophia, has confessed to the murder and been arrested.The story oscillates between Diara’s past life in Zimbabwe and her present life in the UK-through a murder trial, confessions by other family members and obstacles faced by survivors of incest in establishing personal relationships. The latter is highlighted by Diara’s struggle to establish a romantic relationship with her friend from University, Xander Joubert. Xander and his wife Saskia are struggling to start a family and her many miscarriages have resulted in a fragile mental health. Diara and Xander do establish a short-term relationship resulting in deceit and lies. The consequences threaten a very tenuous marriage and even more fragile friendship. A friendship that struggled to survive the ingrained racial prejudices inherent in Southern Africa.It is over a year of being incarcerated before Sophia goes on trial for the murder and during the trial, we are faced with the handicap that women face in the legal system: a conservative outlook and misinformation being very apparent. Her lawyer, Rudo Shava is a feminist who is very able and plans her defence impeccably. Her major obstacle is a hostile, nonresponsive accused person. Rudo’s focus is on proving self-defence on the part of Sophia. The murder charge brings with it, a maximum penalty of death by hanging. Can the prosecution prove that that Sophia planned and plotted to kill her husband?A contemporary psychological thriller which focuses on the intersection between domestic and sexual violence, racial prejudices and a legal system which is unsupportive of women and children.

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