AustLit

Cast the First Stone is a novel set in South Africa between 1949 and 1963, a period during which the brutal system of apartheid was devised and cultivated....The story is about an English-speaking journalist, Peter Stanley, working in the repressive, often violent racial environment of the country. He is married to an Afrikaner, which also means living with ethnic divisions within the family. ... The novel's main character, Peter Stanley, is a composite based on my father, Ernest Shirley, and most of the other characters are composites based on my family, my father's colleagues and acquaintances. (pp.1-3).