Coconut Shells — Michael Rogers

I am a coconut because my body is black but my spirit inside it is white. The skin is just a shell, fragile and frail; when you cut into it there is a sense of shock when the white milk is revealed. If you split my coconut shell in half and remove it you will see a completely new body on the inside; I think she looks a bit like Marilyn Monroe, only with better legs and juicier hips.

Lerato Dlamini is the next Queen of South Africa on her way to her coronation. During her journey she explores a beautifully diverse land being torn apart by division and hatred as Apartheid takes hold. But out of the hopelessness a steady light is shining: Nelson Mandela refuses to give up the fight for freedom even when he is jailed as a terrorist.

After a chance encounter with Mandela as a child, Lerato is deluded into thinking that he is in love with her. She thinks he is commanding her to rescue him from jail and promising her that upon his coronation as King they will be married. The years roll on and the likelihood of her mission succeeding appears to wane, but like Mandela she never gives up hope. Will she reach Cape Town before its too late?