Book of the Month April 2008

Sound Diagnosis a harmonized approach to medicine - Sound Diagnosis to the rescue - a little prompt at the bedside, when you need sound guidance to see through a hazy clinical picture and make sense of a problem in the most lucid and confident way.
How will you benefit from this diagnosticum?
As your bedside companion it will:
Shed bright light on unclarified diagnostic pictures
Encourage use of a systematic method of diagnosis
Structure and simplify diagnosis
Help you define a problem
Make you notice and respond to diagnostic key pointers
Direct your energies to the core of the problem
Give your knowledge an opportunity to surface
Make you more aware and open to reading signs of disease
Serve as a ward-round guide
Keep you fresh and motivated with each case
Tie up the loose ends, enabling you to complete a diagnosis
"I came upon the drawings of Gerard Hoffnung in 2002 whilst browsing in the bookshop of the Royal Festival Hall in London. I am delighted to combine the strengths of artist and physician to appreciate the music in medicine and to help you hear the "symphony" when a problem comes to resolution. Suddenly it all comes together to crescendo, just before the diagnosis is made, into a naturally harmonized and realistic diagnosis" Maria Ribeiro, in the Preface

Source: Sound Diagnosis a harmonized approach to medicine /Maria Ribeiro

Book of the Month March 2008

Thabo Mbeki the dream deferred © 2007/ Mark Gevisser

What happens to a dream deferred?

This question, from one of President Thabo Mbeki's favourite poems by Langston Hughes, provides the thread for this magisterial new biography. In the long shadow of Nelson Mandela, Mbeki has attempted to forge an identity for himself as the symbol of modern Africa. And yet, as he prepares to leave office in 2009, his legacy remains intensely contested.
This book is both a work of deep scholarship and a gripping, highly readable story. By tracing the path of Mbeki's life, it sheds new light on his political personality and provides unprecedented insight into the dramtatic role he has played in South African history.
Mark Gevisser brings to life the voices and places that have made Thabo Mbeki - the frontier of the Eastern Cape; "Swinging Britain" and neo-Stalinist Moscow in the sixties; the frought world of African exile, of fatherhood and family. He tells the story of South Africa's black elite over a turbulent century - from "black Englishmen" to revolutionaries to heads of state - and Mbeki's own transition from doctrinaire communism to economic liberalism. He comes to grips with the current political turmoil bu examining the history of a man who has caried, on his shoulders, the collective burden of a country seeking to realise a dream too long deferred.
MARK GEVISSER has been working on Thabo Mbeki: the Dream Deferred since 1999. He was born in Johannesburg in 1964 and educated at Yale. His journalism has appeared in dozens of publications in South Africa and abroad; his celebrated Mail & Guardian political profiles were collected in Portraits of Power: Profiles in a Changing South Africa. Recently he has also been working as a documentary film maker, a museum exhibition designer, heritage consultant television scriptwriter. He lives in Johannesburg and Cape Town.

Source: Thabo Mbeki the dream deferred©2007/Mark Gevisser

Book of the Month February 2008

Field Guide to the Animals of the Greater Kruger Park /Christo Joubert, Ulrich Oberprieler & Burger Cillié

The Greater Kruger Park is not only Big Five coutnry; it is home to thousands of plant and animal species, each a link in a delicate ecological web.
The Park is situated in the Lowveld, a wide coastal plain of fairly dry savanna. The mosaic of habitats created by the various soil types and larger rivers disecting the Park supports a myriad of organisms, both large and small.
The purpose of this book is to introduce the richness of animal life to the Park's visitors. All the common, readily seen species are thus described here in an unique, user-friendly way which combines text, photographs and easily recognised symbols.
This book allows you to experience 68 mammal species, 215 birds, 17 reptiles and 8 amphibians. Enjoy!

Something about the authors:

Christo Joubert, a keen wildlife photographer, is practicing environmental management in the platinum industry. He is also involved in youth environmental education programmes and is co-author of a field guide to the animals of Pilanesberg.

Ulrich Oberprieler, a well-known ornithologist and wildlife photographer, has co-authored four bird and mammal guides with Burger and Christo. He is presently education manager at the National Zoological Gardens and is widely recognised for his superb wildlife courses.

Burger Cillié is a well-known wildlife photographer and the author of various field guides to the mammals of Southern Africa. He has co-authored three bird guides with Ulrich, and a book on the animals of Pilanesberg with both Ulrich and Christo.

Source: Field Guide to the Animals of the Greater Kruger Park ©2007 / Christo Joubert, Ulrich Oberprieler & Burger Cillié

Book of the Month January 2008

How to identify trees in Southern Africa by Braam van Wyk & Piet van Wyk ( 2007 )

Tree identification is generally perceived as difficult, all the more so in a botanically diverse region such as southern Africa, where about 2 100 species occur naturally, not to mention several hundreds more that have been introduced from elsewhere in the world.
How to Identify Trees in Southern Africa - a first of its kind for the region - provides the background knowledge essential for tree identification. The book promotes an approach that will equip readers to use any field guide to trees with greater ease and more confidence. Starting with the basics of plant form, it systematically uncovers the structure of trees to enable a clear understanding of what to look for when trying to identify an unknown tree.
The book is divided into two parts: Part One, well-supported with colour illustrations and photographs, describes the various parts of a tree and their significance for identification. Part Two features a key to 43 tree groups based on easy-to-observe stem and leaf features. As a first step towards identification, the group-recognition approach has proved to be more helpful to the layperson than the often-used formal botanical families. An icon is used to depict the principal characters of a group, thus making it easier for the beginner to record and conceptualize tree diversity. Group accounts present explanatory notes on group characters and tips on species identification. A selection of tree species is described and illustrated, and a list of all the southern African plant families represented in each group is supplied (greater coverage of species is featured in the authors' Field Guide to Trees of Southern Africa, 1997)
Something about the authors:
Braam van Wyk gained a master's degree in Botany from Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education. He later joined the teaching staff of, and was awarded a doctorate by, the University of Pretoria, where he is currently Professor of Botany and Curator of the H.G.W.J. Schweickerdt Herbarium. An authority on the classification of trees, he is the author of numerous scientific articles, papers and books including Field Guide to the Wild Flowers of the Witwatersrand & Pretoria Region (Struik, 1988) and Field Guide to trees of Southern Africa (Struik, 1997)
Piet van Wyk (1931-2006)no relation, but also a graduate of Potchefstroom University, worked as a research biologist at the Kruger National Park prior to his retirement in 1991. In that year he was awarded a Chancellor's medal by the University of Pretoria and an honorary doctorate from Unisa, in recognition of his contributions to botany, nature conservation and environmental education in southern Africa. An excellent photographer, Piet's extensive travels throughout southern Africa enabled him to build up the largest collection of photographs of native trees.

Source: How to identify trees in Southern Africa 2007 by Braam van Wyk & Piet van Wyk

Book of the Month Dec 2007

Mpumalanga History and heritage 2007 edited by Peter Delius

Mpumalanga is known for its spectacular landscapes and its teeming game reserves. But is also has an extraordinarily rich and vivid history that has not been adequately recognised or represented, and whose potential contribution to tourism, education, and economic development therefore remains largely unrealised.
This ground-breaking study is aimed at ensuring that the province's compelling past lives on in the present. Written by some of South Africa's foremost researchers, and richly illustrated with historical and contemporary photographs, it tells a story beginning with the geological records of the first emergence of life on Earth more than three billion years ago, and concluding with the dawn of an inclusive democracy in South Africa.
Areas covered include geology, archaeology, rock art, traditions of early settlement, frontier conflicts, the South African War, conservation, economic development, political struggles in the 20th century, and the significance of all of this in the light of contemporary debates over heritage.
This book is aimed at raising awareness of and stimulating debate about issues of history, heritage, and identity in Mpumalanga. Ultimately, it seeks to invite and contribute to new initiatives to preserve the province's heritage and present it in ways that will enrich the lives of current and future generations.

Peter Delius is professor of history at the University of the Witwatersrand. His previous publications include The Land belongs to Us and a Lion Amongst the Cattle

Book of the Month November 2007

Fritz Eloff 'n Man tussen die leeus 'n leeu tussen die manne - n Biografie deur Jan Roderigues.

Fritz Eloff - Die legende leef voort.

Lede van die Internasionale Rugbyraad, selfs 'n uitgesproke en wêreldbekende All Black-slot soos Andy Haden, asook die Suid-Afrikaanse pers het professor Fritz Eloff die hoogste lof toegeswaai vir sy vermoë om die administrasie van rugby na hulle penne laat gryp en kort voor lank het die wêreld geweet: As rugby ooit 'n heer van die hoogste orde opgelewer het dan was dit Fritz Eloff; die man wat hulle as dié sport se grootste jintelman beskryf het.

Maar rugby het glad nie die prof se lewe oorheers nie; daarvoor was sy liefde vir die natuur heeltemal te groot. Sy veeertig jaar lange navorsing op die Kalaharileeu was 'n openbaring; sy belangstelling in die wel en wee van die Boesmans laat 'n mens met nuwe oë na hierdie nomadiese en dodelike jagtertjies van die rooiduine kyk, terwyl sy studie van die Namib-olifante 'n nuwe wêreld vir die dierkundiges laat oopgaan het.

Vir toekomstige geslagte gaan die prof se lewensverhaal nie bloot net 'n naslaanwerk wees nie, maar ook dien as inspirasie vir diegene, wat soos hy, arbeidsaamheid, toegewydheid en lojaliteit baie hoog aanslaan.

Bron: Fritz Eloff 'n Man tussen die leeus - 'n leeu tussen die manne. 'n Biografie deur Jan Roderigues 2006

Book of the Month October 2007

Kruger's Pretoria : Buildings and personalities of the city in the nineteenth century with drawings by Hannes Meiring / Vivien Allen.

Available form abebooks.com

Pretoria's history is comparatively recent. It was once the capital of Kruger's Republic, a time of turbulence and insecurity; and it was the Western outpost of what in those times were the wilds of Africa.

The houses and public buildings that have remained from that period are interesting from an architectural point of view because there was no local tradition or style. The visitors and settlers who were there were unusual men with strong and often eccentric personalities; the homes that they built are used by Vivien Allen as the basis for a lively and very personal history of early Pretoria.

Over 200 photographs support the text, often rescued from family albums, and from archival sources. In addition, there are many specially-drawn illustrations of old buildings by Hannes Meiring.

The book is introduced and welcomed by Judge J.F. Marais

Something about the author:

Vivien Allen was born in England in 1925 and came to South Africa in 1966, where she lived in the family's ancestral home, Melrose House. Since coming to this country she has worked as a free-lance journalist and broadcast.

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Book avalaible at abebooks.com