False River is the story of a black sheep son of an aristocratic Southern family gone to seed. Growing up, Cam Daltry made a name for himself in his hometown by stirring up trouble. But the smirks he'd always been given for his boyhood sins turn to genuine shame when he goes AWOL from the Marines, gets thrown in the brig, and then gets shipped back home to Louisiana with a dishonorable discharge. So he enrolls in college, lands a blueblood girlfriend, and sets out to give the good old Southern straight and narrow an honest try. It isn't long before he finds trouble again, and this time it's worse than ever. The law comes after him, his parents write him off, and he sets out on a desperate odyssey to get help from his estranged older brother Andrew--an ambitious law student at Tulane. But after being drawn into the seedy underbelly of the French Quarter, Cam falls in with a wild slew of characters in a downward spiral that shows him the dark truth of himself and pushes him ever closer towards a final and irreversible attempt at redemption. He goes to daring but ever more pitiful extremes to escape his troubles, but they quickly reach such shocking depths that even Andrew is swallowed up by them. It's only in the painful wake of accidental tragedy that Cam sees how to follow his older brother's lead, and becomes determined to make a man out of himself with what will be the truest but also the hardest acts of his life.

Riffing on truth, lies and secrets, this collection uses fiction to explore fact, and fact to explore fiction. Fictional characters muse upon the truth behind real people, non-fiction pieces contain short interludes of fiction, fiction is written to read like an essay, made-up elements slip into true accounts. These pieces range the world – from America, to Antwerp to Aotearoa – and talk about writers and writing, famous figures, family members, witch-burning in Denmark, cyclones and numerous pertinent and stimulating topics. All brilliantly written, each will leave you thinking and desperate to jump back in for more.

“You are too close to the water,” Paul whispered. “There are barbels in the mud. They will wake up if you step on them.” When Paul and Dominique are sent to boarding schools in Natal, their idyllic childhood on a Free State farm is over. Their parents’ leftist politics has made life impossible in the local dorp school. Angry schoolboy Paul is a promising poet, his sister his confidant. But his literary awakening turns into a descent. He flees the oppression of South Africa, only to meet his death in London. Dominique Botha’s poignant debut is an elegy to a rural existence and her brother – both now forever lost. The novel is based on true events.

When Paul and Dominique are sent to boarding schools, their idyllic childhood on a South African farm is over. Their parents' leftist politics has made life impossible in the local town school. Angry schoolboy Paul is a promising poet, his sister his confidante. But his literary awakening turns into a descent. He flees the oppression of South Africa, only to meet his death in London. Dominique Botha's poignant debut is an elegy to a rural existence and to her brother - both now forever lost. The novel is based on true events.