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A Tale of Love and Addiction in ‘Mad Bad Love’


Sara-Jayne Makwala King’s new book, ‘Mad Bad Love (and how the things we love can nearly kill us)’, is pretty much instantly relatable.

From the title (who hasn’t experienced mad, bad love before?) to the story instantly sucks you in, and the raw descriptions and vivid details will keep you turning the pages.

What readers will discover is the sheer and utter hell of loving a heroin addict.

As a recovering addict herself (love, drugs, and other substances) and issues stemming from being an adoptee to self-harm, King meets the ‘love of her life’ at rehab (I know, right).

The connection is instant and sees her initially donning rose-tinted glasses and entertaining fantasies of happily ever after.

Through a series of twists and turns, the two step in and out of each other’s lives until many years later, King falls pregnant with their daughter ‘Zora’, and it seems she will finally get her white picket fence life.

The author told an online interviewer recently that she opted to protect both Enver’s and Zora’s identities by choosing names starting with the same letter as theirs.

King is already in the public eye as a popular radio personality and a bestselling author living in Cape Town.

As a fan of hers since reading her debut novel, ‘Killing Karoline’, and someone who follows her on social media, it felt strangely familiar to read her writing about the very time period I’ve been following her.

Despite being very private online, and only providing slivers of her real life, in ‘Mad Bad Love’, King lets it all hang out. She is so brutally and unashamedly honest that as a reader your heart can easily break at what she’s been forced to endure in her life so far.

There can be no doubt King is an incredibly strong woman, and one can only admire how she prioritises her mental and emotional health and recovery, booking herself into ‘The Clinic’ every year, instead of heading to tropical resorts to sun herself on the beach like all her friends.

Enver, however, not so much. He veers from hiding his addiction to openly begging, borrowing and literally stealing his new-born daughter’s clothes to feed his seemingly insatiable dependency.

The book is so incredibly insightful on several levels, particularly on the many nuances of addiction, as well as the different ways it affects the loved ones of addicts.

King writes about trying to control the devastation Enver’s need for heroin enacts on the fragile little family, and her personal battle to keep putting one foot in front of the other when he disappears for months during her pregnancy.

Her story is both maddening and awe-inspiring. Published by Melinda Ferguson Books, an imprint of NB Publishers, ‘Mad Bad Love’ follows ‘Killing Karoline’, an equally brave, honest and engaging account detailing her shocking origins as the product of an illicit union between white and black at the height of apartheid South Africa.

In beautiful detail, King writes frankly of the inherent trauma adoptees live with, particularly transracial adoptees, and how this ties into an increased likelihood of facing different mental health challenges, addiction and suicide.

She paints a very vivid picture of the trauma adopted babies face, unable to be articulated, but very real and felt throughout the body that is perpetually in search of the love of their biological mother, and the sense of belonging that is almost impossible to recreate.

King is a really clever, engaging and talented writer, but her power lies in her ability to tell her story in such devastating honesty that the reader veers through her highs and lows right alongside her. Sometimes shouting down at the open pages, at other times being brought to hopeless tears.

This is exactly what brilliant writing should do – narrate the unbearable joys and pains of life to strike a chord with readers.

Certainly, there are many who can identify with King’s story so far, told in both ‘Killing Karoline’ and ‘Mad Bad Love’. Both books provide deep insight for adoptees and their families, those affected by addiction and various mental health challenges, and those who take responsibility for their mental and emotional healing and well-being.

Even just those who love a beautifully written and incredibly engaging story.

My advice is to buy both books, and get reading!





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