Blog Archives

A bit of fluff, Anne Else

A Woman’s Place Redmer Yska Penguin Books, $20.00, ISBN 97840143568087 A Woman’s Place is a small book in every sense. Penguin’s web page classes it as both “humour” and “gift book”. Though it does have pages and a cover, it…
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Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Review

Survivor stories, Christine Dann

Abortion Then and Now: New Zealand Abortion Stories from 1940 to 1980 Margaret Sparrow Victoria University Press, $40.00, ISBN 9780864736321   It was estimated in the early 20th century that a quarter of all maternal deaths in New Zealand were…
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Posted in Gender, Health, History, Non-fiction, Review

Heroines needed, Dale Williams

Leading the Way: How New Zealand Women Won the Vote Megan Hutching HarperCollins, $39.99, ISBN 9781869507923 “Tis the glory of New Zealand that her sons were first to see/That there never was a free land where the women were not…
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Posted in Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review

The other f-word, Rae Julian

Rethinking Women and Politics: New Zealand and Comparative Perspectives Kate McMillan, John Leslie and Elizabeth McLeay (eds) Victoria University Press, $50.00, ISBN 9780864736109 Rethinking Women and Politics is based on a series of papers prepared for a Wellington workshop in…
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Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Politics & Law, Review

Unpretty lives, Alison Gray

Trust: A True Story of Women and Gangs Pip Desmond Random House, $39.99, ISBN 9781869792435 This is a brave book in a number of ways. The women who have contributed are brave. Their stories are not pretty; their present lives…
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Posted in Gender, History, Review

Legions of the brave, Rhonda Pritchard

Serial Survivors: Women’s Narratives of Surviving Rape Jan Jordan The Federation Press, $49.99,  ISBN 9781862876798 It could easily be a Jimmy McGovern script. A “good husband and father of three children”, with a secret lover on the side, stalks and…
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Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Review

They fuck you up, Andrew Fieldsend

The Ship of Dreams: Masculinity in Contemporary Pakeha and Maori Fiction of Aotearoa/New Zealand Alistair Fox Otago University Press, $45.00,  ISBN 9781877372544 In this academic but engaging study of masculinity in contemporary New Zealand fiction, Alistair Fox of the University…
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Posted in Gender, Language, Literature, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

Not just good friends, Bill Hastings

Mates and Lovers: A History of Gay New Zealand Chris Brickell  Godwit, $49.99, ISBN 9781869621346 This review comes to you from the backwoods of Ontario. It is a crisp autumn evening. I write this in front of a fire in…
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Posted in Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

Faith and works, Linda Burgess

Women with a Mission: Rediscovering Missionary Wives in Early New Zealand Cathy Ross Penguin Books, $39.95, ISBN 0143020501 Be careful what you leave behind you. That unflattering photo could well be the one chosen for your obituary (should you be…
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Posted in Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

So far, so George, Paula Boock

When She Became He: A Change for Good John Thorp Cape Catley, $27.99, ISBN 1877340073 When I worked as a publisher a well-worn line about New Zealand autobiographies was that only All Blacks and politicians could sell enough to make…
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Posted in Gender, Memoir, Non-fiction, Review
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