Chase Your Shadow

John Carlin grew up in Argentina and in the UK and spent 1989-95 in South Africa as the Independent's correspondent there. He has also lived in Nicaragua, Mexico and Washington, writing for The Times, the Observer, the Sunday Times, the New York Times, among other papers, and working for the BBC. His previous book, Playing the Enemy, was the basis of the film Invictus, directed by Clint Eastwood, which earned Oscar nominations for both Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman.

In 2012, Oscar Pistorius became the first amputee runner in history to compete in the Olympics, and was hailed as a hero not only in his native South Africa but around the world. But everything changed for Pistorius in the early morning hours of February 14, 2013—Valentine's Day—when he shot and killed his girlfriend, model Reeva Steenkamp. He was arrested and convicted for culpable homicide in a seven-month murder trial broadcast from Johannesburg to an international audience.
Acclaimed journalist John Carlin details the wrenching emotional breakdowns and merciless interrogation of the accused and the courtroom confrontation between a white, privileged, twenty-seven-year-old male athlete on trial for murder, and the black female judge who alone would decide his fate—held in a democratic country trying to exorcise its history of racial hatred and endemic violence against women—exposes the complex social and political realities of post-Apartheid South Africa.

“Carlin offers complete and absorbing coverage of this bizarre story, removing the mask from a previously one-dimensional role model.” — Kirkus Reviews