By MICHELE HEWITSON
A tense, spare tale which contrasts the claustrophobic interiors of its perfectly cast characters' lives with places nobody willingly goes: from lonely stretches of desert to the suburbs of Cape Town where dreams are punctuated by the sounds of howling alarms and dogs.
Daniel is at the city council; he is separated from his wife. "Although his ambitions had always been too vague to act upon, they were strong enough to imbue him with a sense of failure."
He attaches himself to a low-life crim called Frank, to provide some relief from the dullness of his life. He witnesses Frank kill a hooker and goes to the cops. The case falls apart and Daniel finds himself in the police protection programme run by a woman called Erica. Erica is very good at her job: she kills the witnesses.
Edgy and truly frightening. The writing is superb.
Namibian-born, Van Der Berg has spent most of his life in South Africa. He now lives in New Zealand. This is his first novel in English.
* Black Swan Crime, $26.95
<i>Zirk Van Der Berg:</i> Nobody dies
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