The Children's Day Author:Michiel Heyns The Children's Day follows the life of Simon, a boy living in a free-state village during the apartheid years of the 1960s. Through a series of finely drawn and illuminating episodes, the novel captures the essence of what it was like to grow up in a society fraught with strange and often violent contradictions of class, race, gender, and... more » language. Adolescence, in all its angst and confusion, is explored through the acute eyes of Simon, who is torn between scorn for his surroundings and a desire to belong. It is through the lives of the novel?s poignant, vulnerable, and sometimes eccentric characters ? Mr. de Wet, with his disconcerting eyes; chinless Betty; Miss Rheeder with her ever-present red shoes; Trevor, with his blonde bangs and pink shirt ? that Simon comes to understand what the complexity of love can mean.« less