New Times

New Times (2017) is a novel by South African author and journalist Rehana Rossouw. Set in Cape Town in the weeks surrounding the 1995 World Cup, the book tells the story of an intrepid political journalist navigating the newly post-apartheid era in South Africa. New Times is a spiritual successor to Rossouw's 2015 debut novel, What Will People Say?, which is also set in Cape Town but takes place nine years earlier.

The protagonist is Aaliyah "Ali" Adams, a young newspaper reporter in Cape Town in 1995. While her family is Muslim, Ali isn't terribly devout and actively rejects the patriarchal elements of her home community in the Bo-Kaap, the Muslim-majority neighborhood where she grows up. Ali is also gay but has no plans to tell her family or anyone connected to the Muslim community for fear of being ostracized or disowned. Meanwhile, 1995 is a hopeful yet politically fraught era in South African history. Only a year removed from the end of apartheid and the beginning of Nelson Mandela's presidency, the country's leaders urge reconciliation between whites and people of color. As a part of this plan of national reconciliation, Mandela encourages citizens of all races and social classes to rally behind the Springboks, South Africa's national rugby team and long the target of enmity from black South Africans. That year, South Africa hosts the Rugby World Cup at stadiums across the country, including Newlands Stadium in Cape Town. Despite Mandela's sunny Rainbow Nation rhetoric, socioeconomic problems persist, including income inequality and a surge in AIDS cases, about which political leaders are conspicuously silent.

When her father dies after a long illness, Ali must return to Bo-Kaap to offer financial and emotional support to her mother and grandmother. Her mother's grief is agonizing, and she eventually suffers an emotional breakdown and hospitalization. When she returns from the hospital, Ali's mother is in a state of severe depression and unable to offer support to the other two women in the household. Meanwhile, Ali flirts with her own emotional breakdown when the newspaper where she works shuts its doors and Ali loses her job. Fortunately, she obtains a job as a political journalist at a highly respected weekly newspaper.



With her career stabilized, Ali faces other emotional challenges. Sumaya, a close friend and former lover is engaged to a Muslim man; preparing for the wedding causes great psychological strain for Ali. She also reconnects with her friend Lizo, an employee of President Mandela who is suffering post-traumatic stress disorder from his time as a political prisoner on Robben Island. Finally, Munier, who has always been a continual source of support for Ali, is suffering from AIDS and nearing death.

As the nation prepares to embark on an ambitious Truth and Reconciliation Commission designed to heal the psychological wounds of the apartheid era, Ali learns of the mysterious death of a young soldier fighting on behalf of the apartheid cause. After meeting with the young man's parents, Ali embarks on a crusade to uncover the truth about his death. However, with officials bent on reconciliation narratives, Ali encounters a great deal of resistance from state officials who are eager to move past this ugly chapter in history.

As the lives of the Adams family women continue to spin out of control, Ali's grandmother takes it upon herself to help her daughter and granddaughter by bringing in a traditional healer. Ali's aversion to religion and mysticism makes her resistant to the process. At the same time, Ali feels that she can sense the Islamic demon, Iblis, tormenting her as a manifestation of her own personal agony. Throughout the novel, she wrestles with painful memories, including the experience of growing up with a sick father, her inability to act publicly on her sexual desires, and the trauma of witnessing acts of horrific violence as a reporter during apartheid.



By the end of the novel, South Africa wins the World Cup, and Mandela appears at the trophy ceremony wearing a Springboks shirt, symbolizing a moment of profound reconciliation for the country. And yet, for both Ali and South Africa itself, the ghosts of the past can never be fully escaped.

South Africa's Sunday Times newspaper calls New Times "a bittersweet reflection of a fraught, partly hopeful, sometimes dismaying moment that most who lived through never realized would be the beginning of a sickening descent."