BOOKS: Magical Animals

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:

Magical Animals
by Beatrice Wiltshire
Illustrated by Di von Maltitz
BW Publications (P.O. Box 17727, Bainsvlei 9338, Bloemfontein,
South Africa), 2006. 71 pages, paperback. $11.00 (U.S.)

South African activist Beatrice Wiltshire for many years
campaigned against the shocking animal experiments carried out by the
apartheid war machine at the Roodeplaat Research Lab in Pretoria,
which, she recently explained to ANIMAL PEOPLE, “was a front for
the South African Defense Force’s Chemical and Biological Warfare
experimental program.” Some of the former staff operated a nearby
lab called Biocon, Wiltshire recalled, and, she said, “Roodeplaat
seemed to have close links with a mysterious French laboratory in the
bush, close to the Hoedspruit military base.” Wiltshire publishes
the South Africans for the Abolition of Vivisection newsletter,
called The Snout.

In Magical Animals, Roodeplaat becomes Darkacts, where the
villain Dr. Ingleman is testing new types of weapons on dogs. His
name echoes that of one of the real-life Roodeplaat vivisectors.
Kalazar, whose role is equivalent to that of Gandalf the Grey in
Lord of the Rings, dispatches a dog, a cat, a sheep, and a mouse
to foil Ingleman’s wicked plans.
The story is aimed at children, but adults may also enjoy
the book. –Chris
Mercer