Amazing book set in WWII South Africa...aparthied, boxing, much, much more. ( )

Really a wonderful book. South Africa, aparthied, boxing, natural geography, it's got it all. ( )

First with your head, and then with your heart...
Amazing, just amazing book. Peekay's (P.K. or Pisskop) story of triumph over every possible adversity: racism in 1940's South Africa, no dad, a born-again Christian mother, poverty. He meets amazing characters along the way and develops his Power of One philosophy to survive: Strive to excel, camouflage, integrity, courage...
Nanny, grandpa Chook (the chicken), Hoppie, Doc,Geel Piet, Hymie ... and many more colourful characters fillhis life.Oh, I forgot the Judge, a right-wing racist Africaans who makes his life a misery at boarding school when he is 5, but pays for it when they meet again in a Rhodesian copper mining town when PK is 18, 'the future welterweight champion of the world' and a mature man.
Looking at Bryce Courtenay's website www.brycecourtenay.com, it turns out this is autobiographical... ( )

a telling story of life in apartheid South Africa ( )

Really enjoyed this book, so much so, I've added it to my "favorites" list. Based on Courtenay's childhood in South Africa, he does a wonderful job weaving a Mark Twain style - boy coming of age /adventure story - with a Dicksonian cast of characters. Though fiction, I'd love to know what parts really happened. I Highly recommend this novel. ( )

well-written, boy's coming-of-age story. Sad, but good. Powerful images. Very different from the movie. ( )

First, maybe only book that I enjoyed less than the movie. ( )

First, maybe only book that I enjoyed less than the movie. ( )

This book is one of my all time favorites! It really has something for everyone. Action, adventure, coming of age... Set in the South African apartheid era it is interesting to view a period of racism from the viewpoint of a country other than the U.S. Although it can be a bit slow to begin, it becomes truly engaging if you stick with it. ( )

I would have to say that this is one of the best books I have ever read and it made me a big fan of Courtenay's.It's the story of Peekay, a young English boy, growing up in South Africa, during WWII. The reader is taken inside Peekay's world and how he deals with racism, growing up and fighting for his dreams. I laughed, cried and smiled through the whole book.

A great novel that shows the transition of boyhood to manhood. ( )

Nice uplifting story by a foreign author. The Power of One is set in South Africa in the time around the time of WW2 and follows Peekay, a young boy growing up in a strange country gripped by apartheid. A train ride taken at a young age convinces him to pursue boxing, which he excels at as a result of hard work.

The story starts off slow, but picks up about 80 pages in when he joins a prison boxing squad. Courtenay does a great job of keeping the story interesting and showing the progression of time as Peekay grows up.

I felt that the ending was a little abrupt, but after thinking on it for a day I guess it was put there to lend closure to an early trauma in the young boy's life, and it was as good a place as any to close out the story.

Unfortunately, while I've been able to find The Power of One at all of the local libraries here (possibly because it was adapted into a film in 1992), the sequel, Tandia, is difficult to find either locally or on the internet. Times like this make it very frustrating to read foreign authors. ( )

Excellent book about young South African boy who boxes. I can't remember much more, but I do remember absolutely loving this the summer before my freshman year of high school. ( )

First, maybe only book that I enjoyed less than the movie. ( )

If you have seen the movie with Stephen Dorf the book is 10 times better. They changed the ending for the movie so they could not go on to make the sequel, namely Tandia.

Bryce Courtney is one of my favourite writers, and I am always moved by his books.

The power of one tells the story of Peekay and his journey from childhood to adulthood. It is set in South Africa and begins as Hitler comes to power in Germany. Race, friendship, death, and self-belief are all themes that run through this story. ( )

What an incredible read. Every "character" is so well developed and the story instantly grabbed me. A truly memorable read of Peekay's rise to become the fighting champion he wants to be. ( )

Rated: PG13: There is a young adult version of this book... Don't Read This Version. There is too much that you miss.This was one of my top 5 favorite books of all time. I heard an interview with Bryce Courtenay once. He says that this book is mostly autobiographical. This book illustrates horrible injustices about South Africa during the middle of the Twentieth Century and how one brilliant English boy deals with them. ( )

I had seen the film and enjoyed it more than this condensed version. Parts were very painful to read. It was inspirational. ( )

Unputdownable, read it all one Saturday

One of my most favorite books of all time. A powerful story, beautifully told.

Bryce Courtenay knows how to tell a great story. P.K. is sent to boarding school as a young child, and as an English child in a Boer school during a time when tensions ran high, he is mercilessly taunted and abused. He learns to hide his intelligence, his differences, as best he can. He survives his years in the school, and through events in his life and a chance meeting with a boxing champion, becomes a superb boxer, graduates Oxford and goes on to demonstrate 'the power of one'. Unique and empathetic characters add to the excellent read; Courtenay has created a story you will never forget. ( )

I first picked up this book by chance really. One of my older brother's teachers had assigned it for summer reading, and I happened to pick it up one day and started reading. And while I was young at the time (12 or 13sh), I immediately fell in love with this book.

For those unfamiliar with the book, it tells the tale of Peekay, a young English boy in a Boer South Africa. While suffering a brutal childhood at the hands of his classmates, he soon encounters the sport of boxing and becomes hooked for life. As he strives towards the goal of becoming boxing champion of the world, he encounters a multitude of teachers, from a German Pianist, to a Black Boxing coach to a Russian miner.

To be quite honest, this book is simply beautiful. The images of Africa are simply stunning and the lessons that Peekay learns are universal. 'First with the heart, and then with the head' becomes the mantra of our young hero. He learns lessons on racism, endurance and perhaps most importantly, self-respect. Though he is tortured by his fellow classmates and mercilessly picked on, he endures none the less, and in the end, turns out better for it.

While this book definitely deals with some more adult themes, I recommend this book to all ages, including those making the awkward transition into the teen years. It deals with the issues that will become more predominate as life goes on, including dealing with your fears and of never, ever giving up on your dream, no matter how hard life seems.

The fact of the matter is, this is without a doubt a modern classic. Its imagery stunning, its themes eternally relevant. This is much more than a boxing book, it is a masterpiece. ( )

I avoided reading this book for years, because I was put off by the boxing theme. What a great mistake that was. This book was about so very much more than boxing.

What an incredible, amazing book! I loved following Peekay's growing awareness as he grows to manhood. The characters who become part of his life are absolutely (absoloodle) unforgettable. Doc, Grandpa Chook, Nanny, Hoppie Groenewald, Mrs. Boxall, Geel Piet...and so many more are so important in Peekay's life, and are written so wonderfully. Dickens couldn't have written them any better! (In fact, now that I think about it, this novel is quite Dickensian in many ways.)

Some of the incidents may be a bit contrived (there are many coincidences), but they never, ever feel that way.

This novel is first and foremost about the social fabric of South Africa at the dawn of Apartheid, just after WWll, and about the rift between the Boers and the English caused by the Boer War. It is also about independence and self-reliance, finding one's true self (after attempting to blend in for many years)...and so much more.

The writing is brilliant, the fabric of the story is so rich and textured. The Power of One is truly an unforgettable, absolutely brilliant book.

One small bit of nit-pickiness: I would have liked Peekay to be a bit less of a messianic figure to the Africans...a bit less perfect in their eyes. But the book is so incredible that this complaint is nothing, really. ( )

This book starts off very good, but becomes tiresome long before it ends. ( )

3491. The Power of One, by Bryce Courtenay (read Oct 18, 2001) I don't remember ever having heard of this novel by a South African who now lives in Australia, though since I started reading it I have seen it mentioned on a book board I follow. It was strongly recommended by a longtime friend whose recommendations I view with favor. This is Courtenay's first novel, and at first I was not very impressed. It begins with the protagonist at age 5, an Anglo kid in South Africa. It developed into a very powerful story, which I found profoundly moving. I am not very interested in boxing, but I found some of the boxing accounts exceptionally attention-holding. This is a stupendous story, and is surely as good a book of fiction as I have read in a long time. I watched the movie right after I finished the book, which is a mistake since when one admires the book as much as I did this, any deviation form the book seems sacrilegious. So I did not appreciate the movie, which seemed a mere polemic. ( )