SOURCE: "Digging Their Own Graves," in Book World—The Washington Post, Vol. XXII, No. 11, March 15, 1992, pp. 4, 11.

In the following review of An Act of Terror, Preuss relates the structure and conflicts of the novel and its theme of "aletheia," or "truth as remembrance."

André Brink's new novel is touted as a political thriller, and it is a very effective one, but that is just part of the story. An Act of Terror is a modern parable and a highly mythologized history of southern Africa's oldest white tribe, a story that concerns black Africans only indirectly; its real subject is the self destruction of the Afrikaners.

"Today it's no longer black against white, we don't want to repeat the mistakes of the previous generations. It's democrats against racists," one black character tells the white protagonist, Thomas Landman, who at the time of this conversation is not yet a terrorist...