An excerpt from the chapter…
#LoveSex&Death
I think Reeva was scarred and thus naive when it came to love, same as Oscar was. Their idea of love was like being in a dream, you have to close your eyes to the world in order to dream…and especially dreams of love…
But as most of us eventually – hopefully – realize, love is that most vital area where you need to be most awake. Love in the romantic sense may seem the most like dreaming, and may feel that way, but much of those feelings aren’t real. True love is work. True love is a shared project, it is DOING things together. And you can’t do anything with your eyes closed. 
That romantic immaturity, given a cocktail of glitz, glamour, money and media, is a recipe for a disaster of monumental proportions. It means not only tightrope walking with your eyes closed, while your own ghosts and demons come to the surface, but putting up a brave face to sell to the world, and your partner. There are three-too many balls being juggled there….
Reeva’s attachment to the idea of being in love meant finding somebody to nurture and heal. By the act of healing Oscar, she could also heal herself. And considering her financial stresses, perhaps she thought that partnering with Oscar could provide a better life.
On 8 February 2013, less than a week before her death, Reeva posted this haunting image to Instagram:
“…breathing in some fresh air and chatting about life…”
Yes, contemplating the tree of life…and how to rise above her raising. And how and when and who to have children with and to raise herself.
The tree is what connects the Earth to the Heavens, and Reeva was contemplating her connections…and where they could take her.
But look carefully…what you see is not one tree, but several…and only one (on the left) is catching the sunlight. Meanwhile the tree on the right, Oscar’s, has become tall and dark and has begun to blot out the sky….
I think the possibility of finding somebody who needed her as much as she needed him was exhilarating. They ran in the same circles and were moving in the same direction. But that kind of luminous possibility will quickly dim when your stars are not aligned with the right person… or worse, you find yourself with a dangerous person. Although June would like to believe her daughter had not been intimate with Oscar, there are many signs that tell a different story…
Available on Amazon, November 20, 2014
Juror13 
As a career woman myself, what having a successful career means is that you have choice.
Someone looking for a man to raise her up would put her focus on that and not be building her own career to such an extent. That takes time, it takes commitment to study and means staying home when you could be out looking.
She would inevitably only meet men of means, because she was beautiful and going to be a success herself. There are plenty of rich men in the legal fraternity. Roux for example! So to me, she was looking for real love and a healthy relationship, as she was going to advise the young women she was due to address.
Because Reeva had lived with a man for two years before OP, it does not make sense that June Steenkamp could not accept them being lovers.
It is almost certainly true, but perhaps things had changed and Reeva had not yet told her mother.
Reeva was different from his other girlfriends. They were little girls, without real careers and no doubt he was totally the boss.
Reeva was a grown woman, model and television celebrity and no doubt as is the way with jealous possessive men, he felt he could not control her. She had too much independence and many admirers.
You can see in the photograph of them together, the way he is looking at her out of the side of his eye, that he is overawed by Reeva.
Getting angry when she talks to another man at a party, walking out, spoiling an innocent situation, all the actions of a jealous man with a short fuse.
A spoiled little rich boy, who is not used to being rejected or his girlfriend meeting another man for coffee.
I was wondering if you sell your books in any other form than kindle? I’ve not been able to download it properly (I’ve got a Mac, it doesn’t work on my computer – even the Mac friendly version) I’d love to purchase your books. Your website has been so amazing – thanks so much for providing all the details/comments you have.
Hi Emma,
Thanks so much 🙂 Right now, Resurrection and Revelations are available in paperback, for purchase on Amazon. We are working on getting the others in hard copy format as well and can let you know when those are avail. In the meantime, here are some instructions for downloading Kindle on Mac (below). Sounds like you have already tried this, but I figured I’d pass along the link just in case it helps. We really appreciate your interest in these narratives. Please feel free to share a review on Amazon, and you can always communicate your thoughts with us via our blogs or social media. Take care, Lisa
http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/mac/download
Aside: Juror13 or anyone did the prosecution mention anything about the jeans out the window. Was there a connection between the jeans out of the window and the window being open. Mr Fossil from web sleuths is saying something about when the Standers arrived the front door was already open or something.
Hi Jason,
The jeans on the ground below the bathroom window were not discussed in court. The police photos of the jeans were entered as evidence but nobody was questioned about them. You can see the image in my Van Staden testimony post.
As for the front door, the Standers did testify that the front door was cracked when they got there, they only had to push it open to go in. OP testified that he had run downstairs to open the door before going back up to retrieve Reeva from the bathroom and carry her down.
It was in his return trip back upstairs that he supposedly kicked (and cracked) his bedroom door to open it wider… In my opinion, a total BS story! There were other marks on that door that do not match his account.
When did OP hold Reeva in his arms and weep – I think OP said he did that in his testimony. Yet Mr Fossil said there was no blood on the inside of the front door? … and I say just now there would have been a trail of blood leading to the front door … before as you say he said he then went up stairs. So he called Stander at 3:19 am? ran downstairs to open the door, then back upstairs again. When Stander entered did he not see OP carrying Reeva downstairs?
So was there a trail of blood leading up to the front door and if not when did OP sit holding Reeva crying in the bathroom (I’m sure OP said that) …
OP claims that when he busted out the toilet door and gained access to the toilet room, he held Reeva (her head on his shoulder) and cried. He then half dragged/half carried her to the bathroom floor.
Tried to use Reeva’s phone to call emergency, which we know is a lie because he called Stander… Threw her phone on ground and ran to get his phones, claims he got both his iPhones which is nonsense. Used one to call Stander then emergency, then went downstairs. Of course, that phone was stolen from the scene by Carl, as we know now. The planted phone was left on the floor under debris/towels.
No blood found on bedroom door/handle nor on front door. So…. Something I’ve discussed here before….
He either washed his hands which does not correspond with a desperate man trying to save his woman… Or, he opened the doors & was running around doing stuff (which I believe to be true) while Reeva was dead and still trapped in the toilet room, which means he wasn’t trying to save her, he was saving his ass.
BTW, he had no recollection of the Baba “everything is fine” call that according to his timeline, would have taken place while he was running downstairs. He can’t remember it, but remembers the other calls. What a joke.
Had a look at some of the photos you posted. I see that Reeva had given OP the present & card already. I also looked at the wounds on Reeva – she was shot up real bad with bullets entering her body and fragments rebounding around her body and then exiting. I really don’t understand viewing how those bullets fragment and rebounds inside the body how the Judge could say that a reasonable person with knowledge of those bullets and firing four times angled towards a person in the toilet would not be realising they were shooting with a good possibility of killing.
Yep, that’s why it’s ludicrous and that’s why Nel showed the watermelon video in court… Not to be an asshole, but to show the court that OP knew damn well what certain ammunition was capable of… Blowing people up!
One of the most disgusting lies he told was claiming that he was doing all the screaming the 3 neighbors heard. They said, screams right up until the shots, OP said it was him.
But if you look at his testimony it doesn’t make sense. When standing at the toilet entrance he didn’t see anyone, not even in the shower, so why did he suddenly start screaming like a woman? Even if he was screaming loud enough for people 100+mtrs away to hear, how could he then have heard the “wood moving” sound he claimed??
I promised myself that I wouldn’t review the trial again….now my head is hurting. 😦
@Miktal: Your head hurts, and forever will if you keep tryng to make sense of OPs bs story. Its mostly nonsense, but apparently good enough to get him off the murder charge. Try the more obvious explanation, “they argued, she said things that hurt and angered him, he chased her to the bathroom, she threatend to call police, he shot her before she even knew it was comming”
Makes more sense than the lies he told in court.