Tandia by bryce courtenay

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

Oh Tandia! This one I did not want to end. I thought Power of One was special. This was even more so! I can't believe I didn't jump into this one sooner. I felt more committed and engaged in this story than the original Power of One, and I'm not sure why. Same author, same brilliant writing. I certainly read this much faster and I'm certain it's because this was available as an e-reader, and I got the narrated version, so I could toggle between reading and listening, while at the gym. I've heard enough books narrated to know that the voice can either make the story better, or it can ruin it. The voice narration for this book was amazing. I was rapt!! This story is so cleverly crafted to intertwine with the characters introduced in Power of One. This was a powerful continuation of an amazing protagonist with the addition of a new protagonist, Tandia. Her life is much different than Peekay's, but they are perfectly woven together. I feel like I could go on. If you're still reading this review, thank you. I'll end now but do yourself a favor, mark The Power of One as your TO READ, then go ahead and add Tandia to the same list. Brilliant storytelling.

0 0 Reply

siovannie

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

So far it is a good book. Very heavy reading. Having a hard time reading this book and have set it aside for the time being.

0 0 Reply

Knighteem

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

“Tandia was not aware of her beauty. Her … full lips and close-cropped peppercorn hair were a cultural corruption, an act of sin.”

“To see her extraordinary beauty you needed eyes that made no racial judgement and there were few of those in South Africa.”

TANDIA, the sequel to Bryce Courtenay’s awesome, indeed jaw-dropping novel THE POWER OF ONE, is also a doorstopper that will thrill its readers as it weaves in and out of three distinct stories to form a gripping whole.

First is the gut-wrenching story of the disgusting levels of virulent racism, hatred, and violence that drove South African politics, culture, and life in the mid-20th century in the years prior to Nelson Mandela’s rise to power late in the century as a respected anti-apartheid activist.

“This country is not built on understanding or compassion of the mutual cooperation of its people. It is stitched together with the needle of hate and the thread of fear. The Afrikaner hates the Englishman … the Indians, who came out here as indentured labour, they are hated by the blacks … the white man encourages the native tribes to hate each other. … If one kaffir tribe hates another one, the Zulu, the Sotho, and so on, and the all hate the Indian, then [the white administration] can control and direct the hate.”

Second is the thoroughly entertaining (and quite gripping not to mention rather terrifyingly graphic, at times) story of Peekay’s rise from a talented white gym boxer to become the welterweight champion of the world.

Last, but hardly least, is the romantic drama of Peekay’s and Tandia’s journey from Tandia’s rape as a very young woman indentured in a brothel at the hands of a psychopathic policeman, through their education in law school and their joint efforts to inject racial justice into South African law, to their frenzied and terrifying ultimate flight out of the country from the secret police bent on revenge.

TANDIA is unquestionably a winner but, unlike its predecessor THE POWER OF ONE, Courtenay was simply unable to sustain the breathless momentum of its plot, its character development, and its historic narrative consistently through the entire length of the novel. That said, the occasional flagging of the story’s drive forward really amounted to nothing more than an opportunity for the reader to gather their breath in anticipation of the upcoming shift into a higher gear … in particular, that final climactic chase in the mountainous terrain of the borders of South Africa.

On a side note, I thought it interesting that despite being published as early as 1992, TANDIA was able to make an eerily prescient comment on the growth of “colonial” racism and hatred in modern day Israel directed at the Palestinians daring to live in what the Jews saw as their “promised land”.

“The Jew has come home to the promised land. How is the Jew going to hold his land? Let me tell you, man. He will hold it with feeling. He will die for it. He will learn to hate for it.”

Nazi genocide, South African apartheid, an Israeli-Palestinian war … will the world ever make its way to a legitimate claim to being a post-racial society free of hatred? TANDIA is not the novel to read if you consider yourself an optimist in that regard.

Paul Weiss

0 0 Reply

Terrorking

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

I loved Power of One so much that I ordered this book when I couldn't find it at the library. I read 100 pages but then decided to quit which is rare for me. I just thought it was too dark, very sexual and didn't ever introduce Peekay from the first book. I got rid of it so I wouldn't have it in the house.

0 0 Reply

green_tea515

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

This book picks up where The Power of One ends, but from the beginning, it feels wrong. There were a lot of names thrown at you from the first book, the main one being Jannie Geldenhuis. He "seemed like a nice bloke" in the first book. Natkin Patel who is very briefly mentioned as a ref from Durbin in the flight against Mandoma and Peekay. Mr. Nguni has a much bigger role in Tandia.

But in the beginning of Tandia, you find out Patel has died, Geldenhuis is a POS, and Mr. Nguni is not trusted by most people. Geldenhuis has a chip on his shoulder, and works to make Tandia's life so miserable, she forgets it is his partner who actually raped her. Throughout the book he appears like a bad penny, when she least expects him.

Other favorites from the original book are mentioned, which are mentioned through associations. This is actually one of the things I really liked about the book. People know other people. They are woven together, where Peekay knew Geel Piet, and Madam Flame Flo knew of Geel Piet, but they didn't really know of each other.

My biggest quirk with the book with the constantly changing point of view. It starts with Tandia, then goes to Peekay, then flips to Hymie, then back to Peekay, then Tandia again. I like how the Power of One was written in the first person, and I felt like this book could have been the same way. I also didn't like how Peekay seemed to be a much weaker person. The Peekay from The Power of One, who lived his whole life getting over the torture inflicted by the Judge, would not apologize to him for what happened at the end of the first book. I couldn't put my finger on it, until people mentioned the weakness they felt from the character. I am not even sure I would call it weakness, but instead he is such a different character from the beginning of the book. I didn't like how a lot of my favorites from the first book ended up getting killed in this book. I didn't like how drawn out this book seemed to be, and how some of it seemed like a draft that never got edited.

The Power of One is one of my all-time favorite books, and when I discovered there was a sequel, I decided to try it. However, in the end, I honestly like this book can not live up to the first book.

0 0 Reply

habibisuckslol

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

Spoiler Alert!

First of all, Bryce Courtenay was one of my favorite authors and I was saddened to hear of his passing a few months ago. The first book of his I read was The Power Of One and it went directly to the top of my all time favorites list. I couldn’t stop reading once I started. As readers, we followed the life of PeeKay and watched him overcome huge obstacles in his difficult life because of his courage and strength of character. It was a wonderfully told story that I caught myself thinking about months after I had finished the book.
Then I read Tandia, and was shocked to find out that PeeKay turns out to be a coward in the end. I really had much higher expectations for him as an adult and I think Doc and Giel Peet would be rolling over in their graves because when the real pressure was on, he failed miserably. He sent Dee & Dum ahead of him and both eventually ended up dying because of this. He sent his true love, Tandia, a nearly exhausted city girl with no experience in the type of terrain they were traveling in, to find an obscure village. He then tries, unsuccessfully, to lead his archenemy, Geldenhuis on a wild-goose chase using all of his remaining strength to try and slither his way into the cave where Doc was buried so he could meekly lay down and die next to him. What! Yes, that’s what I thought too. The PeeKay of The Power Of One would never have done that. Something must have happened to him at Oxford that wasn’t mentioned in the book that turned him into a coward.
The real PeeKay from The Power Of One would have done much better. He knew this terrain like the back of his hand and Geldenhuis was completely unfamiliar with the altitude and the terrain. The real PeeKay could have ambushed him several times because of this, but the cowardly PeeKay was content, no, obsessed with running and hiding.
Or, the real PeeKay, before getting shot, would have talked Geldenhuis into “duking” it out at the top of the mountain and beaten him senseless or knocked him off the edge of a cliff.
The real PeeKay would have gone with Tandia and continued to fight apartheid and injustice. He would have loved Tandia honestly and openly and raised their child to become a future leader. Of course, all of this would require great courage and strength of character, and unfortunately PeeKay doesn’t have much of either in this book. What’s also very sad is Tandia fell in love with this imitation PeeKay and never really got to know the PeeKay the rest of us knew. Can you imagine what a powerful team they would have been if she had met and fell in love with the real PeeKay?

0 0 Reply

azrena

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

This book is astoundingly good. If you loved The Power of One it is a must read. All the characters are exactly as before but more deeply developed. There are new characters to fall in love with and the storyline is excellent. It is also one of the most graphically violent books I've ever read (including depictions of rape) but all in the context of the horrors of apartheid. Excellent reading experience overall, but mostly because of the character development.

0 0 Reply

Anime4LifeBaby

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 16,2025

I loved both The Power of One and Tandia. I had to read the Goodreads reviews to confirm my interpretation of the ending. I was pretty sure Peekay died in the end but I wasn't 100% sure. Even though some readers were put off by the ending and how Peekay handles the escape from Geldenhuis, I loved it. It didn't bother me that the "hero Peekay" had faults and I thought he did the best he could to save himself, Tandia, and Dee and Dum. I thought the ending was beautiful. But then, I don't see death as the end, I see it as a rebirth.

0 0 Reply

Leave a Review

You must be logged in to rate and post a review. Register an account to get started.

The Power of One #2

Tandia

bryce courtenay

This edition

More editions

About the author

bryce courtenay

Readers also enjoyed

Community Reviews