Keep a watch on this page for the details of events where I will be talking about my books.
LAUNCH OF BELOW LUCK LEVEL – May 10th, 2012The launch of Barbara Erasmus’ fourth novel, Below Luck Level, at The Book Lounge was a convivial and well attended event. The Book Lounge’s Johan Hugo welcomed the author, describing the book as a wonderful story, full of sensual details – cooking and food, sex and love – with a narrator who learns how important it is to recognise what you have before you lose it. According to Hugo, Below Luck Level takes the difficult topic of Alzheimer’s, and gives it “a positive, sensual edge”.
Jenny Howitt introduced Erasmus, revealing her earlier novels to be equally vibrant, funny, deep and challenging. She described Below Luck Level as showing terrific research into a range of complex topics and a depth of understanding into the heartbreaking dilemma of a family struggling with Alzheimer’s. The narrative, said Howitt, is “sad, honest, heartwarming and funny.”
Barbara Erasmus and Jenny Howitt
Erasmus enchanted the audience with her deadpan observations of the life of a writer. Whether advocating that journalism students “marry money”, describing how to set up a website, or how to conduct one’s research on the bedazzling internet, the author kept the crowd giggling.
Her take on what to write about was both apt and amusing: “Apartheid influenced most South African writers. It was such a devastating policy that had terrible effects on so many people. South African writing focused on Apartheid. By the time 1994 came I had nothing new to add to the existing literature, so I made a conscious decision not to write about any political issues….”
Erasmus concluded with the observation that “unlike many writers, I never write about myself, the people close to me. I don’t have an autistic child; my mother did not die of Alzheimer’s; and to the best of my knowledge, Silver Fox [her husband] never embezzled millions from Old Mutual…”
