Blog Archives

Long ago and far away, Rose Lovell-Smith

The Drover’s Road Collection: Adventures in New Zealand  Joyce West Bethlehem Books & Ignatius Press, $35.95 [approx], ISBN 1883937698 Joyce West published Drover’s Road with Dent in London in 1953. Two further volumes about Gay Allan and the other Drover’s

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Posted in Children, Fiction, Literature, Review, Young adults

Geek chic, Jane Bowron

An Asian at my Table Raybon Kan Penguin, $29.95, ISBN  0143019104 I first encountered Raybon Kan across a crowded news room at The Dominion when I was just starting out as tv critic back in the early 1990s. Raybon had

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Posted in Essays, Media, Non-fiction, Review

Insolent bassists and mad drummers, Mark Amery

Ready to Fly: The Story of New Zealand Rock Music David Eggleton Craig Potton Publishing, $49.95, ISBN 1877333069 I have a confession to make. I’m not much of a reader – at least not in the always-head-in-a-novel kind of a

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Posted in History, Music, Non-fiction, Review

Obituary — Alan Preston

Alan Preston (1932-2004)   As I write this, in one week exactly it will be Alan’s birthday. On October 29 Alan would have celebrated 72 years. Thus I have been spared the annual brain-wracking for a suitable present. Alan, you

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Posted in Obituaries

Sisterhood is powerful, Robyn Munford

No Friend Like a Sister: Exploring the Relationship between Sisters Jenny Neale Victoria University Press, $39.95, ISBN 0864734700 No Friend Like a Sister gives a rich account of the relationships between sisters. Jenny Neale used focus groups (women aged between

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Posted in Review, Sociology

Maurice Shadbolt

Maurice Shadbolt 1932-2004 Writer Maurice Shadbolt died in Taumaranui in October after a long illness. He worked as a journalist and a scriptwriter before going to Europe in the late 50s. Two years later he published his first book, a

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Posted in Obituaries

Full lives and f words, William Taylor

Malcolm and Juliet Bernard Beckett Longacre Press, $18.95, ISBN 1877135941 Out of Tune Joanna Orwin Longacre Press, $18.95, ISBN 1877135909 Coming Back  David Hill Mallinson Rendel, $16.95, ISBN 0908783868 Dark Penelope Todd Longacre Press, $18.95, ISBN 1877135968 On a Good

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review, Young adults

Letters – Issue 66

One of the Porlock people Patrick Evans makes a convincing argument in the most recent Journal of New Zealand Literature (“Dr Clutha’s Book of the World: Janet Patterson Frame, 1924-2004”) that “taking control of her own life-story” was a significant

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Posted in Letters

Life in detail, Lydia Wevers

Letters from the Bay of Islands: The Story of Marianne Williams ed Caroline Fitzgerald Penguin, $39.95, ISBN 0143019295 It is always the detail of the past that brings it most sharply to mind. William Colenso’s observation in the 1880s that

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Posted in History, Letters, Non-fiction, Review

Moments of triumph, Joan Rosier-Jones

Transit of Venus Rowan Metcalfe Huia, $31.95, ISBN 1869690834 Love in Shades of Grey Glynne MacLean Penguin, $28.00, ISBN 0143019309 Like Small Bones Ruth Pettis Hazard Press, $24.99, ISBN 1877270784 A first novel does not just appear. It is usually the

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
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