Authors OnLine -

The following article which featured a profile of one of our earliest authors, appeared in the December edition of Writers' Forum. Annette Willoughby has currently finished her second book, Born Singing, the sequel to Innocent in Africa and is in talks with a mainstream publisher.

ANNETTE WILLOUGHBY took a trip to Southern Africa which surprised her partner who was working on the Highland Water Scheme in the mountains of Lesotho.

It was the beginning of a journey which was to tell Annette as much about herself as the country she came to know and love: the poverty and charm; danger and delights.

Lesotho is landlocked by South Africa, something of an isolated enclave protected from the delights and detritus of tourism.

Life for the Basotho depends much on the seasons and ancestral spirits, despite the early attempts of missionaries to establish Christianity.

Annette Willoughby is by nature a natural adventurer. She acts on a whim and follows through with resolution. She is also a considerable writer as she shows in her book, Innocent in Africa. It's full of humour, compassion and a novelist's eye for detail.

The book is packed with anecdotes and observations from the hostility that still lurks against the British from the Afrikaners to the simple ambitions of the black population.

As a teacher she sought work across the border and found a job at a nursery school in Ficksburg. It was one of the first to open its doors to non-white children in 1994.

Here she met the first generation of the new South Africa: South African, English, Indian, Chinese, Basotho, Jordanian, Portuguese, Spanish, Austrian, Danish, Zulu, Dutch and German.

Annette writes: "I felt the tears prick my eyes. Ambassadors of this age would grow up believing their friends may be black or white, clearly not a problem in this classroom."

Later she taught at an all-black school where the ages of the pupils ranged up to 28 as students struggled to learn English to equip themselves for a better job.

There's adventure, social commentary and some acute observations from Annette Willoughby in her book Innocent in Africa published by authorsonline (ISBN: 0-7552-0009-8) at E12.99.