‘I am not recovering. I am recovered. You, too, can be a recovered addict.’ Imagine going from schoolboy experimentation with drugs to being so addicted that you begin planning your parents’ murder so that you can get money (for more drugs) from your inheritance! Sadly Marco’s story is not an isolated one. Marco Broccardo was an ordinary boy from an ordinary family. He had parents who loved him and provided him with a safe and caring home. He had older sisters who doted on their little brother. He had friends and he played sport at school. When he experimented with weed and then with coke and ecstasy, he was no different from the circle he socialised with and partied with at weekends. Drugs made him feel great. What was the harm?

Brutally dragged 780 metres beneath a taxi – a young woman’s inspiring story of survival, courage, and the will to live. ‘13 September 2011. The story would shock thousands and be remembered by many for years to come. It would be plastered all over the papers and continue to attract interest well after the shock factor of what happened had passed. Reports and articles would be written, and “facts”, as given to reporters by some of those involved and willing to be interviewed, would be recounted and repeated in all forms of public media over the months and even years that followed. And although these versions would generate widespread outrage, none was entirely accurate.The stories were about me. I was there. I am Kim McCusker, “the girl who was dragged by a taxi”.’

“On my better days friends find me flirting with the nurses, cigarette in one hand and scotch in the other, but if I listen carefully I can hear the tribute concerts starting up. There they are, celebrating my life like never before, and here I am, knock knock knockin’ on heaven’s door. That rhymes, doesn’t it? I think I might even feel a song coming on but I’m so tired and the words are slipping away and the music is fading into a soft chant round my bed and Madala was spot on, he said when God says He want you, we can’t run away. I know Bafo, I know. I’m not running anymore.”

Welcome to the story of Sami – entrepreneur, blêrie influencer and social media content creator. Throughout her time on Earth she has constantly asked herself what she believes to be the most important question in her life: ‘Why do these things always happen to me?’ From almost manslaughtering her teacher’s unborn baby, shattering her dad’s dream of an athlete spawn and almost being murdered by a goose, she certainly has some stories to tell. In The Memoirs of a Clumsy Potato Sami Hall takes you through some of the life events – tough and challenging events – that changed her forever and shaped her into the weird, clumsy, constantly tired potato that we know and love. The road hasn’t always been easy and there have been several obstacles along the way, but as Sami herself would tell you, it was all part of the journey and that her story is far from finished.

The Real Interior not only allows the reader a behind-the-scenes peek into the glitz and glamour of design and décor, but into a career once never considered an option for a young girl, born in Soweto. As one of the first black and very recognisable faces of Interior Design in Africa, Nthabi Taukobong was thrust into the limelight from the very start of her profession. Spanning a career of more than 23 years she has worked on esteemed residential and leisure projects for presidents, African royalty, captains of industry and five-star hotels, to name but a few.