Playing in the Light

Description: This "novel revolves around Marion Campbell, who runs a travel agency but hates traveling, and who, in post-apartheid society, must negotiate the complexities of a knotty relationship with Brenda, her first black employee"--

Brief description: Zoë Wicomb (1948-2025) was a South African writer living in Glasgow, Scotland, where she was emeritus professor at the University of Strathclyde. She is the author of Still Life, October, The One That Got Away, and Playing in the Light, all published by The New Press, as well as You Can't Get Lost in Cape Town and David's Story. She was an inaugural winner of the Windham-Campbell Prize in fiction.

Review Quotes: "Post-apartheid South Africa is indeed a new world. . . . With this novel, Wicomb proves a keen guide."
--New York Times

"Delectable. . . . Wicomb's prose is as delightful and satisfying in its culmination as watching the sun set over the Atlantic Ocean."
--Christian Science Monitor

"[A] thoughtful, poetic novel."
--The Times (London)

"Deep and subtle. . . . This tight, dense novel gives complex history a human face."
--Kirkus