Thirteen Cents

K. Sello Duiker was born and raised in Soweto, South Africa, and went on to study journalism at Rhodes University before moving to Cape Town. His varied experiences while living there form the basis of Thirteen Cents. He also wrote two other novels, The Quiet Violence of Dreams (2001) and The Hidden Star (published posthumously in 2006). Duiker was widely considered one of South Africa's most promising young novelists before his untimely death in 2005 at the age of thirty.Shaun Viljoen is a Professor in the English Department at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, and the author of a forthcoming biography of the writer Richard Rive.

"A gritty, dagga-infused tour through a Cape Town underworld of street children, hustlers, and cruising 'johns.'" (Words without Borders) "K. Sello Duiker's short novel, Thirteen Cents is simultaneously gruesome, violent, deeply disturbing, whimsical, and beautiful…. Told from Azure's perspective, Duiker weaves a narrative that lays bare the violence, exploitation, racial and sexual politics found just under the surface of South African society." (Africa Is a Country) "Duiker is to literature what Steve Biko is to politics, both having died at the tender age of 30 but leaving indelible footprints in our collective memory." (Mail & Guardian) "A 13-year old South African boy turns tricks in Cape Town in Duiker's emotional whiplash of a debut novel, available in the US for the first time…. With lucid imagery fluctuating between dreams and rationalized escapism, Duiker—through genuine insight, a captivating voice, and candid child-narration—explores a world ruled by primary instinct." (Publishers Weekly) "This entry in the Modern African Writing series, dotted with slang and obscenities in various languages, holds the reader with its vivid descriptions of the gorgeous setting, with the striking portrayal of the physicality of Azure's daily life—the misery and the beauty of rain, the joy of keeping warm—and, finally, with the magical realism of his escape, which brings the recognition of those we know are out there, but we do not see." (Booklist) "This slim novel tells the story of a street child, Azure. As such it is a biting social commentary, which will leave very few readers unmoved.… Be warned that this is not an easy book to read. The language of the streets is not an easy one, and somehow the words we are all so familiar with as spoken epithet become more foul by their appearing in print. The brutality of life on the streets and its language forms an interesting — and at times stylized — contradiction to the often lyrical nature of Duiker's prose." (Cape Times) "Thirteen Cents goes to the core of what has been a clear subject of avoidance for writers: the astonishing rate at which children are now victims of a (violent) society intent on turning a blind eye to the plight of its weakest members." (Feminist Africa)