James Grant

About this book

The novel is, at its core, a deep exploration of the moral considerations that drive crime and whether there is some point or level at which crime cannot be considered to be moral in the circumstances. The novel addresses these questions by engaging with an overarching story of true crime, supplemented by relatively more minor, related or unrelated, true crime stories. The main question of whether crime can ever be moral, together with other questions of morality, including the value of life itself, is based on the real-life dilemma into which the main character, Gideon, was placed when he stole a huge consignment of drugs from a powerful “Godfather” style gangster. This itself gave rise to dilemmas, but the true dilemmas arose when the Godfather kidnapped Gideon’s brother and threatened to kill the brother if Gideon did not return the drugs. On its face, this seemed simple to Gideon until he began to realise that if he refused to return the drugs, he could change the lives of those who depended on him — and even the lives of others who did not depend on Gideon but who were desperately in need of help.

About James:

James holds a PhD in criminal law. He taught criminal law as an associate Professor of Law at a premiere university in South Africa: the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. James has about 20 accredited publications to his name, including one book. In 2015, James left formal academia and began a criminal defence practice as an advocate. For three sessions spread throughout 2019-2021, he acted as a Judge designated to the criminal High Courts. He now lives in Denmark and continues to write. This is his first true crime novel.

Excerpt

Chapter One: The Garden of Good and Evil

The morning sun rose over Gideon, who lay amongst the flowers outside the door of his corrugated iron shack. The light pierced through his eyelids, which he forced closed — harder and harder as the sun rose. Eventually, the light pulled him back from his disturbed sleep to consciousness. ‘Fuck! I am still alive,’ he thought to himself. His lip was split, his fingers prickled, and his left hip and both shoulders ached. The sun was too bright. It pierced through the tiny red veins in his eyelids. The higher the sun rose in the morning sky, the harder he pushed his eyelids closed. The bright light was getting brighter and was turning his dark black world bright red. He had started sweating and shaking. He had spent the evening where he had most evenings, at the local tavern, the Pot. There, he was the unofficial security guard, and in exchange, the practice had arisen that he drank for free. Gideon sometimes managed to moderate his intake. But he was deeply troubled by several questions — especially the meaning of it all — and so often, he lost all control. Gideon had been short and skinny when he was young. He was called a ‘runt’ and mercilessly teased and bullied. He learnt to hate bullies — and he learnt to deal with them. …