The family of slain South African rapper AKA has slammed a book that purportedly details his tumultuous relationship with his late fiancé, Anele Tembe, describing the expose as “distasteful and opportunistic”.
The Tembe family, who willingly participated in the writing of the book, this week remembered their daughter on the third anniversary of her death.
This was after NB Publishers revealed last Thursday that journalist Melinda Ferguson was to release a book about Anele Tembe and Kiernan “AKA” Forbes’ relationship, titled When Love Kills, which is expected to be published this month.
In a statement, the Forbes family expressed their disapproval of the book, which they said was written without their consent.
“We are not in any way associated with Melinda Ferguson’s book and we do not endorse it. We distance ourselves from the contents of the book. When Melinda reached out to us we respectfully and rightfully declined to contribute to her book.
“We cannot give any further comment on the book as we are unaware of its contents. We do, however, find the intended publication of the book and the timing distasteful and opportunistic,” the family said.
In a post on Facebook, the author of the book, Ferguson, said that she had been moved to write the book because of the couple’s reported abuse of drugs.
Ferguson confessed to being a recovering addict herself. According to NB Publishers, the book details “a whirlwind of toxic obsession, alleged substance abuse and violence”.
“I wrote this book in an attempt to try to understand a story about two people who fell down a rabbit hole of toxic love,” Ferguson said.
“Something kept driving me to keep on in search of some kind of truth about what happened and why they were now both dead,” she wrote.
“I have been through my own kind of hell in my life as an addict and as someone who has embarked on dangerous and obsessive relationships. Their story spoke to me. It broke my heart.”
