However, it was not too long ago that he was forced to self-publish his first novel, ?Inyenzi? ? a story about the Rwandan genocide ? because no one else was willing to back it.

Brown is an advocate by profession, a police reservist in his spare time and, now, an award-winning author. We chatted to him about winning the award, the South African police and writing about the resilience of South African society.

iafrica: Did you think you had much chance of winning the Sunday Times Literary Award, considering you were up against South African literary greats JM Coetzee and Andre Brink?

AB: I was so thrilled and honoured to be included in the short list of five that it never really dawned on me that I could possibly win the award. I so enjoyed just rubbing shoulders with such established and incredible literary people, but the prospect of seriously competing against them did not seem feasible. I was quite stunned when they announced my name at the award ceremony.

iafrica:What does this award mean to an author? Do you think it has changed public perception of you as a writer?

AB:I had the luxury of writing as an underdog when writing both of my two novels. I was a ?part time? writer and nothing was really expected of me: I was writing because I enjoyed it and I thought some people might like to read what I had written.

I said in my acceptance speech that, as the Springbok rugby team knows only too well, when your only fan is your mother, running onto the field isn?t that hard! But now suddenly I feel that I am to be judged against the criteria of a ?real writer? and that there is an expectation to try and live up to. It does create some pressure for me and initially makes the thought of putting pen to paper quite daunting. Hopefully this will fade over time!

iafrica:You are an advocate by profession. When did you first start writing? Has it always been a passion?

AB:I loved writing at school and I was always encouraged to write. I then studied English as an undergraduate degree at university. After that, my writing declined while I studied law, established my practice at the Bar and started a family. (Children are a full-time career on their own!) It was only really in the past seven years that I started writing again; it was always something I wanted to return to, but sometimes one?s life simply does not allow the opportunity.

iafrica:What made you decide to write your first novel ?Inyenzi??

iafrica: ?Inyenzi? was far closer to me as a story than ?Coldsleep Lullaby?. For me the story and the characters in ?Inyenzi? came from my deepest core: I had experienced Burundi and Rwanda before the explosion of violence that tore those communities apart. There was something very special about the people there, and a frightening feeling of tension in the air. It was a conflict that was largely ignored at the time, and it was a story that I really wanted to tell.

iafrica: Which, if any, authors do you feel have had the strongest influence on your work?

AB: As a younger person, I loved the classics, the Russian writers and the South American authors. But strangely enough, I think the greatest influence on my writing has been the South African Afrikaans writers: Karel Schoeman and Ettienne van Heerden stand out for me as having had a profound impact on my writing. For me, Ettienne van Heerden continues to produce some of the best writing in this country.

iafrica: Your award-winning novel ?Coldsleep Lullaby? could fall quite easily into the category of a detective novel. Do you think that being a police reservist has influenced your writing?

AB: My experiences as a police reservist over the past seven years definitely impacted on my decision as to what to write and how to write it. Most, if not all, of the police scenes in ?Coldsleep Lullaby? are drawn from one or other experience that I have had in the police force. Hopefully that gives the book a sense of realism, and an authentic and at times gritty feel. I wanted to try and capture the difficulties and chaotic stresses that face ordinary policemen and women in contemporary South African society.

iafrica: What made you decide to become a reservist?

AB:. During the 1990s I really wanted to make a contribution towards my community and the developing country as a whole, but I was uncertain where my efforts should be directed. I became increasingly irritated with the constant complaints that I heard from people about the inefficiency of policing, from people who were doing nothing to try and improve the situation.

It took me a long time to get my head around the idea of being a police reservist, particularly as I had been an activist in the 1980s and had been on the receiving end of some harsh police treatment. It has been an incredible and humbling experience for me and I have nothing but respect and admiration for the majority of policemen and women who go about their difficult job with commitment and determination.

iafrica: Did you find it difficult getting your work published?

AB: I ended up self-publishing my first novel, ?Inyenzi?, because none of the publishers I approached felt that they could publish it. Although the book was a success, self-publication was not a road I wanted to follow again. So when I received the first few rejections of ?Coldsleep Lullaby?, I was ready to throw in the towel and concede defeat. I am so grateful to Zebra-Struik for having the confidence to take the book on and they have turned it into an amazing achievement.

I think that there is so much new writing happening in South Africa right now that publishers are bombarded by manuscripts and must find it very difficult to decide which to accept and which to reject.

iafrica: Are South Africans enthusiastic enough about their own writers?

AB; After ?Inyenzi? was published, I spotted the book sitting on the ?Best Seller? shelf at Exclusive Books. I was so excited: I had visions of retiring to a life of excess and fame, swanning about at cocktail parties sipping champagne and dropping names. Unfortunately, the manager informed me that they had sold all of 25 copies of the book, which had justified its acclaim as a ?best seller?!

The reading public in South Africa is very small; the number of people reading local literature is even smaller. However, having said that, I think that the scope of our writing has been quite limited until now: I think we are seeing a broadening of South African writing in terms of style, content, subject, presentation. This can only serve to attract a wider audience. The recent success of the Cape Town Book Fair seems to confirm this trend.

iafrica: ?Coldsleep Lullaby? deals quite thoroughly with the issue of rape and the law. Do you think that the justice system in South Africa deals with this problem adequately?

AB: The recent trial of Jacob Zuma highlighted the very real difficulties around dealing with rape trials. I think it is too easy to blame the law for apparent failures of justice: the law is a human construct which tries to regulate human conduct. A human being has to sit in judgment and decide who is telling the truth and who is lying: nowhere is that decision more acute than in a rape trial, particularly where there is no objective evidence assisting the court either way.

What amazes me, and was partly the motivation behind writing ?Coldsleep Lullaby?, is how prevalent rape is in our society and how men seem to resort to this violence on women and children as an expression of anger. It remains incomprehensible to me.

iafrica: ?Coldsleep Lullaby? paints a rather demoralising (and yet no doubt accurate) picture of South African society ? rape, drug addiction, racial hatred and the seedy undercover operations of a nightclub. However, throughout, and largely through the female characters, there is the message of resilience and hope. Is this the message you intended?

AB: In both books, ?Inyenzi? and ?Coldsleep Lullaby?, I used a strong (black) female character to carry the themes of both resilience and compassion. In both books the last chapters establish these female characters as being the survivors, unbowed by appalling male oppression and abuse. Ultimately, I think that our hope must lie with these characters: it is the resolve and strength of people like this that can draw even the most desperate community forward.