The Story Behind The Human Spirit by Carole Eglash-Kosoff

Five years ago when I lost my husband, mother, and brother within thirty
days of one another I thought my life was over. After a few months
of trying to understand what my life going forward should look like I
determined to do something positive. I volunteered to teach business
principles to charities in the black townships of South Africa. I was there for
three months and met some amazing men and women. We agreed I would
return the following year to write a book about them. The Human Spirit is
that book.

Apartheid in South Africa has now been gone more than fifteen years but
the heroes of their struggle to achieve a Black majority-run democracy are
still being revealed. Some individuals toiled publicly, but most worked
tirelessly in the shadows to improve the welfare of the Black and Coloured
populations that had been so neglected. Nelson Mandela was still in prison;
clean water and sanitation barely existed; AIDS was beginning to orphan an
entire generation.

Meanwhile a white, Jewish, middle class woman, joined with Tutu,
Millie, Ivy, Zora and other concerned Black women, respectfully called
Mamas, to help those most in need, often being beaten and arrested by white
security police.

This book tells the story of these women and others who have spent
their adult lives making South Africa a better place for those who were the
country’s most disadvantaged.

About Carole Kosoff

Carole Eglash-Kosoff lives and writes in Valley Village, California. She graduated from UCLA and spent her career in business and in teaching. In 2006 her husband, mother, and brother died within a month of one another, causing her to reevaluate her life. She volunteered to work with the American Jewish World Service and was sent to South Africa to teach. She returned there a year later, having met an amazing array of men and women who had devoted their lives during the worst years of apartheid to helping the children, the elderly, and the disabled of the townships. These people cared when no one else did and their efforts continue to this day. It is their stories that needed to be told. They are apartheid’s unheralded heroes and The Human Spirit is their story.

Carole has also completed a historic fiction novel, a pre- and post- Civil War interracial love story set in Louisiana, When Stars Align.

In addition to writing Mrs. Eglash-Kosoff has established the …a better way! Scholarship program, which provides money and mentoring for several worthy local high school students for both their first and second year of college.

All profits from the sale of The Human Spirit will be donated to Ikamva Labantu and other South African charities. The book is available at Amazon, Author House and Barnes & Noble on-line sites as a hardback, paperback and as an e-book.

An avid student of history, Carole Eglash-Kosoff is a native of Wisconsin. After graduating from UCLA, she spent her career in the apparel industry and teaching fashion retail, marketing, and sales at the college level. Her first book is . She has also established the …a better way! Scholarship program, which provides money and mentoring for worthy high school students for both t

You can visit her website at www.whenstarsalign-thebook.com or connect with her at Facebook at www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=553077163.

About The Human Spirit

Apartheid in South Africa has now been gone more than fifteen years but the heroes of their struggle to achieve a Black majority-run democracy are still being revealed. Some individuals toiled publicly, but most worked tirelessly in the shadows to improve the welfare of the Black and Coloured populations that had been so neglected. Nelson Mandela was still in prison; clean water and sanitation barely existed; AIDS was beginning to orphan an entire generation.

Meanwhile a white, Jewish, middle class woman, joined with Tutu, Millie, Ivy, Zora and other concerned Black women, respectfully called Mamas, to help those most in need, often being beaten and arrested by white security police.

This book tells the story of these women and others who have spent their adult lives making South Africa a better place for those who were the country’s most disadvantaged.

Read the Excerpt!

Thoughts of a mother living in

a Black township during apartheid:

When we awaken each morning with nothing, the smallest most insignificant something can bring a smile. A larger plastic jug in which to carry clean water and make fewer trips to the distant fresh water tap, a little sun to dry the damp floor beneath us, even a warm body to snuggle with at night can help get us through another day. Food is expensive; jobs are scarce and pay provides us barely enough to survive. We are less than nothing to the Whites we meet. Drugs, alcohol, and sex, readily available, provide brief escapes from hopelessness. There has to be something better.