Founded by the wRite Associates in partnership with the National Ministry of Arts & Culture, the South African Literary Awards endeavour to pay long overdue homage and honour to literary practitioners and legends, while encouraging the advancement of South Africa’s literary heritage and practice.

Published in 2008, the novel’s other accolades include being shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writer's Prize (African Region), and the M-Net Literary Awards, as well as winning the University of Johannesburg Prize for the best creative debut work in English.

Shepherds and Butchers is a cliff-hanger courtroom drama that, in a potent blend of fiction and non-fiction, explores the psychology and physical details of capital punishment by hanging as incisively as seldom before.

Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking and writer of the screenplay for the blockbuster movie, says: “The riveting way in which Chris Marnewick has fused fact and fiction and explored the fine line between human frailty and human cruelty, makes Shepherds & Butchers unforgettable.”

Shepherds & Butchers by Chris Marnewick I ISBN: 978-1-4152-0134-3 I RRP: R170.00