The Boy Who Never Gave Up (Paperback)

A Refugee’s Epic Journey to Triumph

Andrew Crofts

Emmanuel Taban

In 1994, sixteen-year-old Emmanuel Taban walked out of war-torn Sudan with nothing, and nowhere to go. In the preceding months he was abducted and then tortured by government forces, who falsely accused him of spying for the South Sudanese rebels.

He managed to flee, hoping to be reunited with his family, but ended up going on a long and arduous journey through many African countries to South Africa. For many months Taban lived mostly on the street and faced many dangers, but he refused to give up.

He arrived in South Africa penniless, and with only five years of schooling. Determined to get a proper education, Taban first completed school and then his medical studies. After specialising as a pulmonologist in 2018, he recently made a ground-breaking discovery around the treatment of hypoxemic COVID-19 patients.

Taban overcame extreme poverty, racism and xenophobia to become the man he is today. Heart-warming and inspiring, his life story is one of survival against all odds.

When the 17-year-old EMMANUEL TABAN arrived in Johannesburg from war-torn South Sudan with nothing, he had only five years of education behind him.

Today this former Medunsa student is a highly qualified pulmonologist, with a European Diploma in adult respiratory medicine. During 2020, he was at the forefront of the treatment of Covid-19 patients in ICU.

Taban was the first pulmonologist in the world to perform a therapeutic bronchoscopy on a hypoxemic Covid-19 patient, discovering that some deaths from Covid-19 pneumonia are due to fibrinous mucus plugs.

Madness (Paperback)

Stories of Uncertainty and Hope

Sean Baumann

A leading psychiatrist's professional and personal reflections on mental illness – beautifully written, informative and accessible.

'This book has irrevocably changed my understanding of madness. Through succinct and often poetic accounts Baumann carefully mediates access to glimpses of the brave, fearful, lonely and vulnerable humanities of those suffering from psychiatric disorders, especially schizophrenia. The text, illuminated by extraordinary artwork, compels one to believe that beyond all the distress and despair, there is, and always should be, hope.' – Antjie Krog

For many of us, mental illness is often shrouded in mystery, misconception and fear. Baumann spent decades as a psychiatrist at Valkenberg Hospital and, through his personal engagement with patients' various forms of psychosis, he describes the lived experiences of those who suffer from schizophrenia, depression, bipolar and other disorders.

Baumann argues cogently for a more inclusive way of making sense of mental health. With sensitivity and empathy, his enquiries into the territories of art, psychology, consciousness, otherness, free will and theories of the self reveal how mental illness raises questions that affect us all.

Sean Baumann has worked for 25 years as a consultant to the male acute service at Valkenberg Hospital in Cape Town and was a senior lecturer in the Department of Psychiatry and Mental Health at the University of Cape Town. He obtained degrees in the arts and in medicine and qualified as a specialist psychiatrist in London, UK. His interests are psychotic illnesses, more specifically the schizophrenia spectrum disorders, and chronic pain. He is the editor of Primary Care Psychiatry: A Practical Guide for Southern Africa (2007). His cantata Madness: Songs of Hope and Despair was performed at the Baxter Theatre in Cape Town in 2017.

The Elements (Hardback)

A Widowhood

Kat Lister

'Powerful, humane and deeply affecting, Lister's wise and truthful writing makes this essential reading for anyone touched, and utterly confused, by grief.' Sali Hughes

'The must-read memoir' Red

What does it mean to become a widow at 35?

In her mid-thirties Kat Lister lost her husband to brain cancer. After five years of being a wife and one of being a carer, in love and in and out of hospitals, she became a widow.

In the year following his death Kat seeks refuge in stories of grief and widowhood, but struggles to find a language that can make sense of her experience and the physicality of bereavement. Instead, she turns to the elements – fire, water, earth, air – on her quest to come to terms with her grief, to inhabit her body again, and to find out who she is now.

The Elements is a story of love, pain, hope and, ultimately, transformation.

Kat Lister is a writer and editor based in London. Beginning her career as a music journalist at the NME, she has gone on to write widely for publications including VICE, the Guardian, Marie Claire, Vogue and The Feminist Times, where she was appointed Contributing Editor. In 2017, she joined the editorial team at The Pool, becoming a freelance features and news editor until its demise in 2019. Since her husband's death in 2018, she has focused on investigating her experience of grief, writing widely circulated essays and features for the Sunday Times Magazine, Sunday Times Style and The Pool.