Page 26 - IFV Issue 3 March 2023

Book Reviews

Koos Bekker’s Billions

BY T.J. STRYDOM

With M-Net, Koos Bekker convinced
the business world he had the magic
touch. But it was only the start of an
entrepreneurial journey that would
bring him immense wealth. Bekker
swept in at Naspers, transforming
an Afrikaans printer into a global
technology giant, earning investors
trillions and himself a good few
billion. But how? What were the
methods employed by this boerseun
from Heidelberg?
Financial journalist TJ Strydom
All The Broken Places distils it down to 15 steps, each
BY JOHN BOYNE calculated and effective, sketching
out the winning ways of the elusive in the wealth it created this century.
From the author of the globally bestselling, media mogul. Bekker often gets the But should he be the one lauded for
multi-million-copy classic, The Boy in the credit for the investment in China’s this achievement?
Striped Pyjamas, and The Heart’s Invisible Tencent, a single punt that rivals
Furies. South Africa’s entire mining sector Price R280.00
Ninety-one-year-old Gretel Fernsby has
lived in the same mansion block in London
for decades. She leads a comfortable, hear. And it’s a true story...
quiet life, despite her dark and disturbing Have you ever wondered how we got
past. She doesn’t talk about her escape here? From hunting mammoths, to flying
from Germany over 70 years before. She to the moon?
doesn’t talk about the post-war years It is because we are unstoppable. But
in France with her mother. Most of all, what made us so? Well, we have the
she doesn’t talk about her father, the most amazing superpower: the ability
commandant of one of the most notorious to tell stories. Fairy tales have led us from
Nazi concentration camps. imagining ghosts and spirits to being able
Then, a young family moves into the to create money (yes, really!). And this has
apartment below her. In spite of herself, made us very powerful... but very deadly.
Gretel can’t help but begin a friendship Nothing stands in our way, and we always
with the little boy, Henry, though his want more.
presence brings back memories she would So, get ready for the most amazing
rather forget. One night, she witnesses story there ever was – the incredible true
a violent argument between Henry’s Unstoppable Us – Volume 1 tale of the Unstoppables. Find out how fire
mother and his domineering father, one How Humans Took Over the shrank our stomachs, how our ancestors
that threatens Gretel’s hard-won, self- World spoke to animals, what football can tell
contained existence. YUVAL NOAH HARARI us about being human, how we used our
Gretel is faced with a chance to expiate superpower for good and bad... and how
her guilt, grief and remorse and act to From the author of the bestselling Sapiens YOU have the superpower to change the
save a young boy – for the second time comes an incredible new story of the world.
in her life. But to do so, she will be forced human race, for younger readers. With full-colour illustrations showing
to reveal her true identity to the world. We humans aren’t strong like lions, we the relentless rise and rise of the human
Will she make a different choice this time, don’t swim as well as dolphins, and we race, this is history like you’ve never
whatever the cost to herself? definitely don’t have wings! So how did experienced it before.
we end up ruling the world? The answer to
Price R330.00 that is one of the strangest tales you’ll ever Price R330.00

24 • Issue 3 2023 • The Villager