Stealing Water
A Secret Life in an African City
- Paperback
320 pages
- Release Date
28 February 2009
Summary
When Tim Ecott’s family uprooted from Northern Ireland in 1977 they thought they were leaving behind their troubled lives, including the physical threat to Tim’s father’s life posed by the IRA. They left in search of sunshine and luxury in a colonial ex-pat African setting. His parents sought the financial opportunities that would lift them out of the hum-drum suburban existence of mortgage debts and small town society. However, within six months of their arrival in Johannesburg they were ban…
Book Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780340936641 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10: | 0340936649 |
| Author: | Tim Ecott |
| Publisher: | Hodder & Stoughton |
| Imprint: | Sceptre |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Number of Pages: | 320 |
| Release Date: | 28 February 2009 |
| Weight: | 261g |
| Dimensions: | 198mm x 129mm x 22mm |
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Critics Review
Tim Ecott’s story of growing up in Ireland and Africa is both haunting and funny. He writes with compassion and honesty to give us a truly memorable account of an extraordinary upbringing
Funny, never self-pitying and a pleasure to read - Guardian
There are belly laughs enough, and some serious criminality to boot, but Ecott’s outstanding talent as an author is for pathos. [It] moved me more than once to tears. As an author, Dickens is the comparison - Matthew Parris, The TimesEngrossing […] it’s a love story without romance, or redemption, or a tidy resolution; and all the finer for it - Mail on SundayThe narrative crackles and fizzles along - Irish TimesAn extraordinary account of childhood in a baroque South Africa. Unputdownable - never sentimental, extremely honest and with a positively Dickensian cast of characters - Emma ThompsonThe greatest memoir to come out of white Africa since Rian Malan’s My Traitor’s Heart - it reads like Angela’s Ashes rewritten by Nick Hornby under a baking Johannesburg sun … told with warmth, humanity and humour to burn - Tony ParsonsA truthful story brilliantly told - both funny and moving. I often had to lay the book aside to recover from laughter … Tim Ecott cleverly captures the feeling of an extraordinary life - Lynne Reid BanksTim Ecott’s story of growing up in Ireland and Africa is both haunting and funny. He writes with compassion and honesty to give us a truly memorable account of an extraordinary upbringing - Fergal KeaneAbout The Author
Tim Ecott
Tim Ecott is a journalist and a writer. Initially specialising in Africa for the BBC World Service, he now writes for a wide range of publications including the Economist, the Guardian and Conde Nast Traveller.
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