Hijack! Cracking one of South Africa's most violent carjacking syndicates by Guy Brown

When I bought this book I was quite excited. I thought I was going to learn something about crime syndicates in South Africa, and I read it, and I got some information from it, but there's a hitch. How much can I believe?

The book is not factual, nor does it claim to be. It is supposed to be "faction", creative nonfiction. Of course much of what happens is crime is always hidden, so it gives a writer great freedom if he is allowed to fill in the gaps from his imagination. But inevitably, when I read a book like this, I start with the known facts and extrapolates into the fiction to give me a sense of how true it might be, and this is where the book starts to crumble.

Two of the characters in the story are ex-South African Defence Force members. They were either with 32 Batallion, or with the Recces: In the end I decided that Guy Brown does not have a clue that there is a difference between the two. Recces, or the Reconnaisance Commandos (it's proper name a the time) are special forces soldiers, similar to the SAS. 32 Batallion, on the other hand, was a unit of the SADF unique to the Border War.

When one reads such preposterous statements such as It was only in 1987, when two SADF POWs captured in the battles north of Cela wew paraded on international TV, that South Africa could no longer deny its involvement in Angola the whole credibility of the writer's research is in danger. South Africa's involvement in Angola was denied from 1975 until 1976. There's a famous picture of PW Botha taking the salute on the return of the forces from Operation Savannah in 1976. Numberous operations in Angola, including Protea (1981) were well-publicised in the local papers. Operations with less success, like Ops Super (1982), were kept more quiet. The use of "hot pursuit" operations into Angola were defended in public. There were of course, operations that were deniable, but in general the public were well aware that South Africa had a continuing presence in Angola.

Sometimes things become a little fantastic. The character Paul Ryland was in Ops Savannah, Cassinga, Katima Mulilo, Koevoet, the CCB, Vlakplaas, and Executive Outcomes. Wow! What a career!

If nonfiction can be this creative, why should I believe but a fraction of his story of the creation of a hijacker?

It seems to me that Guy Brown is propagating exactly the kind of disdain of ex-SADF soldiers that promotes polarization, by repeating allegations about torture and murder.

Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance: an enquiry into values. by Robert M Pirsig

This is my second reading of the book. During the first round, I was reading the book in the laundrette on North Parade in Aberystwyth, when a (Canadian ?)woman saw what I was reading. She remarked that she just wanted to ride off on a motorcycle after she had read the book. I was rather surprised, because I hardly noticed the travel part of the book. Being a kind of motorcycle mechanic myself, I had immediate sympathy for the narrator, and he had my attention from the start.

Since the first reading, much water has passed under the bridge. I've had my own spell of mental illness, and the immediate cause of that illness was a lack of Quality. I thought so at the time, but later I learned more the mechanism, so the cause became obscured. Today I can confidently say a lack of Quality drove me mad.

Everything prescribed for getting better is Quality. Everything that causes it is not Qualtiy.