Browsing by Author "Beukes, Lauren"

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    Branded
    (2006) Beukes, Lauren
    Branded is set in an allegorical near future South Africa stratified by an economic apartheid. Cell phones are used for social control, both as passes that provide entry to designated places and electroshock punishment that can be administered by the SAPS. In the wake of a superdemic, crime and anti-corporate activism are harshly dealt with and the worst punishment is being 'disconnected', your cell phone deactivated, cut off from money, communication and entrance to public spaces. Genetic tampering has become pervasive with mutacute pets and modified police dogs called Aitos. The story follows four characters: Kendra, a young artist who has just enrolled in a flagship corporate sponsorship programme, Toby, a waster who dabbles in journalism, Lerato, an ambitious Aidsbaby raised in a corporate skills institute and desperate to defect to another company and Tendeka, an anti-corporate activist who is becoming increasingly rabid.
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    Writers Researching: Fact and Fiction
    (2014-09-29) Irwin, Ron; Moffett, Helen; Beukes, Lauren; Makholwa, Angela; Dowling, Finuala
    What is the relationship between research and the writing process and between historical ‘truth’ and fictional ‘truth’? Are there boundaries which should not be crossed? In this course writers will talk about the research that resulted in their recent novels. Ron Irwin, author of Flat Water Tuesday, will discuss how he researched people, places and real events and the challenges associated with turning the events of one’s own life into a novel. Helen Moffett, one of the trio behind the Girl Walk In series, will explain how she and her co-authors research and write erotica novels, providing insight into collaboration, champagne and condoms. Award-winning Lauren Beukes will describe how she ‘kinks’ reality in relation to the real-world research that informed The Shining Girls and Zoo City. Angela Makholwa will explore the process of writing the criminal mind, including interviews with a serial killer for Red Ink, and research about women who killed their husbands for Black Widow Society. Readers always assume that everything that happened in your book happened to you, complains Finuala Dowling, so what’s the point of trudging uphill for five hours in search of one sentence? Referring to both Homemaking for the Down-at-Heart and her latest manuscript, The Fetch, she discusses the price of authenticity.