An exceptionally well written book with a rather gloomy story. Nevertheless; it was worth reading for the beautiful prose and I would certainly recommend it to my book reading group.

Set in South Africa, 'The Promise' by Damon Galgut, tells the story of the dysfunctional Swart family, over a period of some forty years, starting near the end of apartheid. The 'promise' of the novel's title is one that is made - and broken, and Galgut offers us a skillfully told, sensitive story that readers will enjoy.

Set in an earlier South Africa, when black rights are not equal, a dying woman makes a promise to her black servant that she will be gifted her own house - however on her death her husband ignores this wish.

Three adult children make up the younger generation: the girls Astrid and Amor, and their brother Anton. Amor is the one character who I liked the most - she cares about equality, cares about the promise, and cares about the future. Astrid and Anton seem to coast along with life and their own ups and downs.

I think I enjoyed the concept of this book more than I actually enjoyed reading it. I couldn't really gel with the characters in any great way, and this is what normally connects me to a story.

Dear Random House.

Firstly, thanks very much for the opportunity to read and review this title.

Unfortunately, I just wanted to let you know that I won't be reading and reviewing this title due to the large number of titles that I currently have on my shelf, and my inability to read them all. For this reason, I've decided to tidy up of my Netgalley shelf and I won't be able to read and review this title for you as I had hoped to do.

I hope to be able to read and review further titles for you in the future, and I wish both you and the author every success with this release.

Thanks and Regards
Kim

So subtle and cleverly written, I’m not even sure how to begin to explain how this book is put together, but it works, and I found I couldn’t stop myself wanting to read on and learn more about these characters.

Spanning from the 1980’s to present day the story is about a white South African family called the Swarts. The book opens with the death of the mother (Ma) and on her death dead, as the farther sits with his wife, the youngest child, Amor, overhears the mother make her husband promise to give the little house their maid Salome lives in with her son, to her, in recognition of the time and care she has given to Ma during her illness. This promise stays with Amor and over the coming years we quickly learn it is of little importance to the remaining members of this decidingly fractured family.

We are introduced to each member of the family at Ma’s funeral and as the book continues we learn from the characters themselves more about each of them and how the family disintegrates as a unit. The plot is slow moving and often sad but the amazing way this book is written and the overall feel of the book kept me enthralled.

The narration is done in a way I have never come across before. Moving around constantly from third, second and first person, at points they seem to be talking to the reader, at others the narrator when talking of a character in the third person seems to enter their thoughts, giving us the dialogue within their head, and with no speech marks it takes a little getting used to but I did. At times it felt like I was watching a play with a narrator and characters all on stage with my head turning back and forth to each as they speak.

Key figures within South Africa’s past are mentioned and so to are the water shortages, power cuts and even sporting events like the Rugby and along with the dynamics within the family, their religions, mental heath, alcohol consumption, and affairs, it all adds up to a wonderfully rounded but subtle look at one family over the years.

The story is divided up into chapters about each of the family members, learning a little of their past from when the book begins, but mainly watching their lives unfurl as the decades move along and each time we see Amor returning home with that Promise.

A really engaging, atmospheric and wonderfully written novel.

Many thanks to Mollie Stewart at Vintage Books for bringing this book to my attention and my advance readers copy via Netgalley.

The Promise promised a lot but it just wasn’t for me.
You can’t like them all try as I did I conceded defeat at 38% in

This distance of the narrative in this book is at odds with the intimacy of its subject matter, and this tension carries right through from the mother's death to the last family member, as the family slowly disintegrates.

The Swart family, white, privileged and wealthy, are first brought together by their mother's death, then drift and tear themselves apart over the years until not much is left. The language is rich and evocative, but the lives of the family are often empty and plagued with disappointments and grief that is implied rather than articulated.

I had a sense of stumbling into a world I didn't fully understand, but that made sense through the unshared pain of many characters. Haunting and thought-provoking in equal measure.

The Promise is the story of a white South African family living on a farm near Pretoria. The book is split into four, dealing with four separate family funerals, from the time of apartheid through to Jacob Zuma’s resignation in 2018. The family members are mainly pretty unlikeable characters, but I found their lives compelling and well drawn.

The title refers to a promise made to the matriarch of the family on her deathbed, that the black maid Salome should be given the deeds to the house she occupied on a different part of the farm. The grieving widower does not keep his promise and everyone suffers from the ensuing guilt, shame, resentment and denial. How do you go on living with people who you’ve mistreated in the past?

A recommended and thought provoking read.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for providing a review copy in exchange for honest feedback.

The Promise chronicles the demise of a white South African family on the backdrop of a country in turmoil, between turning tides.

Sadly it did not work for me due to stylistic reasons and a sparse narrative. I couldn't get used to change in perspective/person between the omniscient narrator and the character at time even in the same sentence. The sudden chance has been at time rather confusing, then annoying, to say the least. This stylistic choices continued with leaps from character to character with no indications someone else is speaking and with time lapses with no way for the reader to figure out how much time has passed. All that made for a somewhat disjointed and cold read, not being truly able to care about anything or anyone.

The narrative itself has a lot of potential, beautiful turn of phrases scattered throughout, and an intriguing family eating itself up from the inside out. Yet there's a tendency for minimalism that goes against the novel. I would have like way more details about the Swarts to make up for the writing style. Yet it almost feels like the whole novel is formed of two funerals and then a sort of epilogue to present us with the faith of the last members of the family. Much, too much is left to the imagination for me to be satisfied. I do not mind coming up with scenarios for a book, but in this case I've already put in too much effort with the style to be willing to do the same for the story.

Many thanks for the opportunity to read this!

This superb novel charts the decline of a white South African family over several decades from the mid-eighties. The mother, Rachel, who converted to Judaism late on in her life – to the discomfort of the rest of the family - dies. Before she dies, her husband Manie promises her that the maid, Salome, will be given the house in which she’s lived for decades. There are two problems however: under South African law at that time, Salome can’t legally own property and, even more intractably, only Amor, the youngest child, who overhears the promise, has the slightest interest in fulfilling it.
The novel changes points of view at a dizzying rate: filtering not only the thoughts of all the family members but other characters as well: priests, lawyers, etc, some of whom only take centre stage for a page or two. You have to work hard to keep up with this book, and that is no bad thing.
Galgut deals out deaths in a baroque manner: the deeply religious Manie, who owns a herpetarium, endeavours to show that you literally can survive sleeping in a nest of vipers if your faith is sufficient. (Spoiler: you can’t).
Of all of them, Amor may garner the reader’s sympathy, but her response to the situation is to distance herself, socially, geographically and financially, from the rest of her family, which isn’t much help to the hapless Salome.
I loved this book. It’s little like The Leopard but with more racism and certainly more deaths.
Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.

In The Promise - Damon Galgut charts the tragic demise of a slightly dysfunctional Swart family in South Africa over a number of years from just before the end of apartheid to 30/40 years later. The story opens with the passing of Rachel - her dying wish to gift her loyal servant Salome ownership of her home. While Rachel"s daughter Amor, only 7 year old at the time, witnessed this request her husband Manie is angered by other events and in complete denial.

The acrimony that develops between father and son Anton becomes a major influence on the terms of the former's will which paves the way for further dispute.

The struggles experienced by successive national leaders following the end of apartheid seem to align with the family trauma and their inability to accept the new reality.

The Promise is beautifully written and brilliantly captivating. I expect it will go on to be widely enjoyed by readers far and wide.

This is a stunning novel and a great read, unless perhaps you are a white South African who is disinclined to support majority rule and thinks your heritage has been stolen! The narrative is centred round the deaths of four members of the same white, farming family – the Swarts – over a timescale that reflects key moments in the country’s struggle towards majority rule. The narrative is held together by the story of the youngest daughter, Amor, who appears to be more principled than her mother and father, her sister Astrid and her brother Anton while the driving theme is a promise made by the father to the dying mother to give Salome, the families long-standing servant, the rights to the rundown house she lives in.

Damon Galgut’s control of the narrative is exquisite. He moves seamlessly between recount, train of consciousness and the odd authorial intervention – well they would behave like that wouldn’t they? The description of people and places is razor sharp. Individually, none of the characters is bad in the sense of being evil but they do tend to be thoughtless, greedy and self-interested. Very cleverly, the black population is not portrayed as the good side either. They can be flawed, bored and, ultimately, ungrateful. As the story goes on, a group of other characters like the self-satisfied lawyer, the smug and greedy cleric and some nasty family friends grow old and change with the narrative. Keeping a handle on this and producing a book which is sarcastic and funny in places but with a real hard edge is a genuine authorial feat.

Why should you read it? It takes you into the heart of a country which is often held up as some shining example of democracy in action and reveals all the complexities which lie behind that easy story. It’s about a promise and how a pledge can be half followed through and that’s a metaphor as well. It’s also about how civil strife leaves terrible scars on a country and its culture but, in all of this, the book avoids sensationalism and mawkishness and has genuine characters who are multilayered and interesting.

It’s one of the best books I’ve read this year and highly recommended.

Not the most uplifting of books and not one to be skipped through.
This tale of family in Pretoria, South Africa delves into the deep divisions of a family and country in crisis through the death and funerals of the diminishing family/

Promises are kept, some broken and dreams are shattered..
This story is to be savoured .

I think it's one of those "it's me not the book" as the style of writing and the character development are excellent.
Unfortunately I found it too depressing for my current mood and it didn't keep my attention.
Not my cup of tea.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

The me of 16 years ago read this South African author’s breakthrough novel which had been shortlisted for the 2003 Booker Prize. I had to check back through my records to see that in the winter of 2005 I quite enjoyed “The Good Doctor”, his tale of a remote rural hospital and thought it well-written but I felt it had failed to draw me in and my verdict was that it was unexceptional. To be honest, I had forgotten all about this opinion when I was invited by the publishers to review his latest title. I was assured a novel “confident, deft and quietly powerful” and “literary fiction at its finest”. I was intrigued.
If “The Good Doctor” failed to draw me in 16 years ago then things were soon put right with this. I was very involved early on and it is the self-assurance of the writing and his handling of life-changing events which kept me hooked. The Swart family live on a farm outside Pretoria and we visit them at various moments in their lives. It is the tale of four deaths and the coming together of those left. Linking these occasions is a promise 13 year old Amor believes she has heard her father making to her dying mother, a promise which is denied, ignored or postponed for decades due to circumstances within the country and within the family. The strength is in the characterisation and interactions between the family members. The tragic trigger points which cause the reunions roll back the preceding years with great economy and truth by the author. I loved the structure of this novel, some demises are tragic, some violent, some tragi-comic but all imbued with a sense of South African history which is extremely effective. There is an appealing calmness which runs alongside the tragedies. It makes me think that the older me might have a greater appreciation of “The Good Doctor” and I would be very interested in discovering more work (Galgut’s published oeuvre consists of novels, short story collections and plays) by this author.
The Promise will be published in the UK by Chatto & Windus on 17th June 2021. Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

The Promise acts as both a study of a family and of a country going through dramatic change and experiencing the emotion of loss and guilt, whether seen in the actions of parents, siblings, family or colleagues, or in the explicit or implicit racism demonstrated by the majority of the white Afrikaans characters.
Dipping in and out of South African every decade, aligned to major events nationally and personally, the story develops in an almost stream of conscious overlapping of voices and perspectives - I can see why there are some poor reviews as this won’t be for everyone but i was utterly absorbed.
Literary fiction at its best

This is a very emotional book, I felt incredibly sad reading every page. It’s beautifully written, and an excellent story, but just incredibly sad.

The story of Amor, and her relationships with her parents and siblings is very emotional, and utterly heartbreaking.

I very much enjoyed this just for the pure heartache..

My thanks to Netgalley and Vintage Publicity for the advance copy.

The Promise proved to be a strangely shaped book that opened with beautifully written prose reflecting the happenings around Amor, a young girl living on a farm in apartheid South Africa. I wish the narrative had kept with her, but instead other family members were introduced and then we had a sudden 10 year leap which brought us into post Apartheid South Africa. The book left me with a feeling of depression as its suffocating story line about the Swart family just made me ask why tell this story at all.

"For there is nothing unusual or remarkable about the Swart family, oh no, they resemble the family from the next farm and the one beyond that, just an ordinary bunch of white South Africans, and if you don’t believe it then listen to us speak. We sound no different from other voices, we sounds the same and we tell the same stories, in an accent squashed underfoot, all the consonants decapitated and the vowels stove in."

Less “Four Wedding and A Funeral” than “Four Funerals and A Partheid”

This book is the latest written by an author twice shortlisted for the Booker Prize (in 2003 and 2010).

It is effectively a family tale – the Swarts, a white and relatively privileged South African nuclear family of five who live on a farm near Pretoria. Their story and the story of those around them.

The family is

Amor - owner of the farm and later the main family business – a reptile park, over time he grows close to an ex Reformed Church Afrikaans minister

His wife Rachel - who re-converts back to Judaism while she is dying of cancer

And their three children:

Anton - whose unplanned birth out of wedlock lead to a marriage Amor’s family considered a mistake – Anton kills a woman when conscripted to the South African Army and deserts before later marrying his childhood sweetheart Desiree who becomes increasingly involved with New Age and Yoga Practices and the leader of a nearby Ashram

Astrid - who converts to Catholicism, has twins and two unhappy marriages

Amor – something of the irreligious conscience of the family, spending her time nursing AIDS patients, refusing to take the family money or to stay in contact, and the only one who holds to the eponymous promise the dying Rachel extracted from Amor – to give the family’s black maid Salome the deeds to her home in the farmlands

There are two very distinctive parts of the book’s execution:

The first is the cyclical structure. The story (which ranges over several decades) is told at discrete intervals in four sections all based around the funeral of a family member (the sections named after the family member that dies in turn as the nuclear group diminishes). Each starts with the circumstances of the death (cancer, snake bite, murder and suicide). Each funeral coincides with an important point of South African history (the rugby world cup victory, Mbeki’s inauguration, Zuma’s resignation). Each has details on the dead body and the viewpoint of the person preparing it for burial. Each features in detail the thoughts of the person carrying out the funeral (and the way their views clash largely with the beliefs of the remaining family members) and each has Amor’s latest attempt to realise the promise.

The second is the narrative voice – a very deliberate and intrusive omniscient narrator which swoops from character to character (including some side characters such as a down and out and a criminal and even at one stage some jackals), switches out of its default third person into first person even second person for the point of view character, sometimes addressing the reader directly and sometimes into a brief first person plural chorus.

I think the book will appeal to a lot of people and I would definitely recommend others to read it

But I have to say it did not quite work for me. .

The family is clearly meant as to represent South Africa and the book to serve as an analogy for the nation’s history but this felt overdone to me. One clear example of this being the coincidental linking of the funerals to important events - at one stage a character comments that Manie has “died at a very inconvenient time” and as a reader we can only think that the opposite – that the fictional timing of the fictional death is very convenient for the move. And when combined with the symbolic deaths (and their symbolic natures), the need for understanding and reckoning (and dare I say truth and reconciliation) which arises from them, the examination of the decaying states of the bodies (standing for the nation) and so on – it all seems rather forced. And no experienced novelist, even in possible irony, should have characters remarking on how things are like (or not like) a novel or have a character member trying but failing to write an autobiographically inspired novel.

And while I can see people admiring what has to be acknowledged as the sheer bravura and dexterity of the narrative voice – I was struggling really to see what admirable it really achieved. One of the effects for example was to have the voice call De Verwoerd “a great man” and the Pienarr/Mandela encounter that of a “beefy Boer and the old terrorist” and I have to say this got my back up a little on a personal level and I also did not respond well to the “plague on all your houses” views of different religious belief.

My thanks to Vintage Chatto and Windus, Random House UK, for an ARC via NetGalley

This one wasn’t for me unfortunately. I found the writing style and form of the book very jarring.
The book is in four sections with no chapters. At times it’s hard to know who is supposed to be speaking, the narrative hops and jumps from person to person without any obvious queue to the reader, it became very confusing at times.

It’s the story of a South African white family set during apartheid and following them over a few decades.

I’m sure there were many metaphors and social commentary here but, the rambling narrative did nothing to keep my attention. The story, a random and rambling tale that I couldn’t take to at all. None of the characters were likeable or even memorable. The whole spiel about “The Promise” made to the black housekeeper and being a central theme to the story is just in the background. In fact the housekeeper barely features here at all.

As I said not for me. Felt a hell of a lot longer than it’s 300 odd pages it was.

Thanks to the publisher for the ARC.