Somewhere in her body she retained every story ever told. She knew every life that had been lived and every life yet to be born.
There exists a prophesy as old as history itself: in times of darkness a pair of twins will be born, a gift to humankind that will save us from ourselves. Whether in ancient Ethiopia, where a warrior queen rises; aboard buccaneer Black Caesar’s pirate ship sailing for Jamaica at the time of the Spanish Inquisition; or in a banker’s opulent mansion in Austria on the eve of World War II , the twins, and their aides and enemies, must face a common destiny.
The Season of Glass is a modern Scheherazade’s tale about these siblings’ travels at pivotal moments: to a marbled city in sixteenth-century India, through dangerous Johannesburg streets in the seventies, and even to the distant future. A shimmering novel, it is a kaleidoscope that works with light and shows us hope.
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It is Ibiza 1997 and rave culture is at its peak. A period of dancing and hedonism forges an unbreakable bond between six friends: an unshakeable tribe is formed. Sharing a deep connection, their dependence on one another will intensify over the years, until one member’s flirtation with death shatters their group. Twelve years on, the tribe reunites for an intense and claustrophobic week at a luxury game lodge in their native South Africa. As each of the friends battle to come to terms with their present and their shared past, old resentments come to the fore, exposing guilt, and respinning their complicated web of relationships. Rahla Xenopoulos’s Tribe is a compelling story of friendships, loves and lives. Exhilarating and potent, Tribe navigates the fault lines of human connections in search of common ground. "Composed of musical dialogue and discordant truths, Tribe is a startling, witty ballad on the difference between privilege and freedom." – Diane Awerbuck, author of Gardening at Night and Home Remedies Available in stores and online via Loot or Exclusive Books
It is Ibiza 1997 and rave culture is at its peak. A period of dancing and hedonism forges an unbreakable bond between six friends: an unshakeable tribe is formed.
Sharing a deep connection, their dependence on one another will intensify over the years, until one member’s flirtation with death shatters their group.
Twelve years on, the tribe reunites for an intense and claustrophobic week at a luxury game lodge in their native South Africa.
As each of the friends battle to come to terms with their present and their shared past, old resentments come to the fore, exposing guilt, and respinning their complicated web of relationships.
Rahla Xenopoulos’s Tribe is a compelling story of friendships, loves and lives. Exhilarating and potent, Tribe navigates the fault lines of human connections in search of common ground.
"Composed of musical dialogue and discordant truths, Tribe is a startling, witty ballad on the difference between privilege and freedom." – Diane Awerbuck, author of Gardening at Night and Home Remedies
Available on Amazon
On a winter’s morning in 1949, in an empty field north of the city of Johannesburg, the lifeless body of a beautiful young girl was found by a passer by. She was identified as Bubbles Schroeder, 18, and she appeared to have been strangled. This is her story. Born in the poorer part of the small town of Lichtenburg, Bubbles grows up with a bitter mother who takes in laundry to make ends meet and a dull-witted aunt. She has never known her father. Bubbles dreams of a better life for herself and she constructs an alluring fantasy world, a world of furs and jewels and Chanel No 5, where handsome men whirl her around a dance floor and send her roses. At 16 she moves to Vereeniging to work in a coal agency and is befriended by the sophisticated Winifred Walker. Winnie teaches Bubbles some social graces, giving her a veneer of sophistication, and, most importantly, she introduces her to erotic love.
Bubbles soon moves on to Johannesburg where she is taken under the wing of a tawdry, middle-aged bookie, Barry, who continues her education, though not in the direction Winnie would have imagined. Barry teaches her tricks to beguile a man. He also introduces her to a social set of wealthy young men who find her captivating and. introduce her to their friends. Bubbles sees her fantasy world within her reach. She is convinced that the perfect beau is about to swoop in and ‘carry her away’ to a grand home and a life of fun and luxury. ‘Don’t go thinking you’re one of them’, Barry warns her, but it is too late. Out of her depth and completely misreading how high society works, Bubbles finds herself in a situation she can’t control. The world to which she aspires turns menacing and, ultimately, fatal.
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In 1992, Rahla Xenopoulos was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Despite the devastating diagnosis, she sought education on her affliction. Although she found an abundance of literature on various mental illnesses, none of it seemed applicable to her. This situation inspired her to write a book chronicling her ongoing efforts to come to terms with a disease that is, in effect, a life sentence. The book recounts her upbringing in an eccentric, loving Jewish family, her struggle with bulimia, anorexia and self-mutilation, her attempts at suicide, finding true love and, finally, the ‘crazy, utterly unpredictable experience of giving birth to triplets’. This is neither a self-help book nor a medical guide. Reading this book will not cure anyone; bipolar disorder is a chronic illness. But it did help Rahla – as it will countless others – ‘to understand the rhythm in the cacophony of this condition’.
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