Tales of the Metric System: Telling South Africa's History One Day at a Time - Hardcover

Coovadia, Imraan

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1415207232 ISBN 13: 9781415207239

Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa, 2014

Synopsis

From a Natal boarding school in the seventies and Soviet spies in London in the eighties to the 1995 Rugby World Cup and intrigue in the Union Buildings, Tales of the Metric System shows how ten days spread across four decades send tidal waves through the lives of ordinary and extraordinary South Africans alike.
An unforgettable cast of characters includes Ann, who is trying to protect her husband and son in 1970, and Victor, whose search for a missing document in 1973 will change his life forever. Rock guitarist Yash takes his boy to the beach on Boxing Day in 1979 to meet his revolutionary cousin, while Shanti, his granddaughter, loses her cellphone and falls in love twice on a lucky afternoon in 2010.
Playwrights, politicians, philosophers, and thieves, all caught in their individual stories, burst from the pages of Imraan Coovadia’s Tales of the Metric System as it measures South Africa’s modern history in its own remarkable units of imagination.

About this title

Review:

"Tales of the Metric System" leaves the reader with a sense of having undertaken a journey through the familiar only to arrive somewhere completely new.
Aminatta Forna, author of The Memory of Love"

"Tales of the Metric System" is about as good a book as you are likely to read on South Africa s transition from struggle to power.
Ray Hartley"

With "Tales of the Metric System," Imraan Coovadia uses an innovative structure and masterful writing to craft a portrait of life in South Africa through the transition away from apartheid. By writing his novel as a series of short stories, with some characters reappearing and others referenced, Coovadia combines everyday life and political turmoil in a thoroughly enjoyable book.
"ForeWord Reviews""

Imraan Coovadia is one of the best novelists to come out of South Africa in a long time. His prose is charming, clever and sly. A must read.
Gary Shteyngart"

Tales of the Metric System leaves the reader with a sense of having undertaken a journey through the familiar only to arrive somewhere completely new.
Aminatta Forna, author of The Memory of Love"

Tales of the Metric System is about as good a book as you are likely to read on South Africa s transition from struggle to power.
Ray Hartley"

With Tales of the Metric System, Imraan Coovadia uses an innovative structure and masterful writing to craft a portrait of life in South Africa through the transition away from apartheid. By writing his novel as a series of short stories, with some characters reappearing and others referenced, Coovadia combines everyday life and political turmoil in a thoroughly enjoyable book.
ForeWord Reviews"

"The collected stories structure recalls David Mitchell's Ghostwritten, or Jennifer Egan's A Visit From the Goon Squad. As a character says early on, 'We get most of our energy from complications.' These complications rapidly pile up, resulting in a layered, multifaceted narrative."--Publishers Weekly

"Using the transition to the metric system as both the catalyst and symbol for radical change, Coovadia places his characters in a historical context that explains their triumphs and shortcomings without offering excuses."--World Literature Today

"Imraan Coovadia is one of the best novelists to come out of South Africa in a long time. His prose is charming, clever and sly. A must read."--Gary Shteyngart

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1415207232
• ISBN 13: 9781415207239
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 400