The Covenant: A Novel

James A. Michener

Mar 2014 · Sold by Dial Press

About this ebook

James A. Michener’s masterly chronicle of South Africa is an epic tale of adventurers, scoundrels, and ministers, the best and worst of two continents who carve an empire out of a vast wilderness. From the Java-born Van Doorn family tree springs two great branches: one nurtures lush vineyards, the other settles the interior to become the first Trekboers and Afrikaners. The Nxumalos, inhabitants of a peaceful village unchanged for centuries, unite warrior tribes into the powerful Zulu nation. And the wealthy Saltwoods are missionaries and settlers who join the masses to influence the wars and politics that ravage a nation. Rivalries and passions spill across the land of The Covenant, a story of courage and heroism, love and loyalty, and cruelty and betrayal, as generations fight to forge a new world.

BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from James A. Michener's Hawaii.
 
Praise for The Covenant
 
“A prodigious endeavor . . . Nowhere else could an American reader unfamiliar with South Africa get so full an understanding of its problems in so engaging a form.”—The New York Times Book Review

Ratings and reviews

this book was well written and showed clearly how the Dutch stole land from the South Africans and forced their Dutch will & language on the indigenous so. African peoples and the Dutch were proud of their wicked usurping . the Dutch should be ashamed and give back. thanks to Mandela and many south Africans that continued the fight against apartheid! Black Lives Matter. on the flip side ..if the African invaded Holland and took their land it would be considered criminal.

Well developed storyline and characters in this novel about the Dutch and how they settled in South Africa. Learned about the Calvanist religion and how it impacted this part of the world.

Utterly fantastic from beginning to end. I learned so much about a fascinating land. Superb!

About the author

James A. Michener was one of the world’s most popular writers, the author of more than forty books of fiction and nonfiction, including the Pulitzer Prize–winning Tales of the South Pacific, the bestselling novels The Source, Hawaii, Alaska, Chesapeake, Centennial, Texas, Caribbean, and Caravans, and the memoir The World Is My Home. Michener served on the advisory council to NASA and the International Broadcast Board, which oversees the Voice of America. Among dozens of awards and honors, he received America’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in 1977, and an award from the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities in 1983 for his commitment to art in America. Michener died in 1997 at the age of ninety.