Sunderland, by Michael Cope and Ken Barris

A novel of literary ideas as much as of character, this fascinating collaboration by two of South Africa's finest wranglers of words comes to a literal crescendo. It is a finely tuned masterpiece to read in one sitting.

Unhappily married Cape Town academic Art Berger is offered what appears to be a lifeline: to reconstitute the final papers of the great South African writer Charles de Villiers into the novel he was writing at the time of his death. Art is uncomfortable about the role of ghostwriter, but the project becomes literary detective work he cannot give up. Introduce De Villiers' beautiful daughter Taryn, and Art is ensnared.