Tuesday, 22 September 2015

Sundowners, 2003, Lesley Lokko ***

Sundowners is mainly the story of Rianne, Gaby, Nathalie and Charmaine and the boys they met while at boarding school in England. The story is set around the 80s and early mid 90s. Rianne is a white South-African, whose family is rich with exuberant lifestyle, they use their societal status (rich white privilege in apartheid SA) to take advantage of the less privileged, mostly blacks. She ended up falling in love with Riitho Modise, a black South-African, whose father is a political prisoner.
The story continued with Charmaine, who, not sure what to do with her life ran away with her "boyfriend" to
Los Angeles, where, unable to make a living, turned into a drug dealer.
Before Charmaine's story, Nathalie, disgustingly experiences how the boy she admires is leaving her mother pregnant. It sort of affects her sex life.
Finally, Gabby the one who always got her head on her shoulders, finds herself drowning in a tormenting relationship. 
This novel is more about how they met and what become of them, along with the obstacles they have to overcome. Considering their social background will they survive? Will they come to terms with their reality? Or continue to deny it?

Lesley Lokko is a writer with a high level of mental creativity with twists and turns. She kept good track of her characters, remember it is a story with four main character. All of whose stories are painstakingly narrated on, which, in my opinion made the novel overly long. My edition is 450+ pages, other edition are 600+ pages. It gave the novel the feeling of a TV series. Would make interesting TV series anyway. 
If you are a  chick-lit lover, you've found your gem. If not, please ignore. The writer, Lesley Lokko is of Ghanaian and Scottish heritage. In order to find out more about her please visit her website by clicking here. She has written a handful of  novels that might catch your interest.

I'd like to know your opinion.

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