Going Up, Going Down: The Rise and Fall of the Department Store Helen B Laurenson Auckland University Press, $34.99, ISBN 186940341X Before TV and 24-hour on-tap entertainment, department stores provided escapism on a grand scale. Looking back to my childhood,…
Blindsight Maurice Gee Penguin, $34.95, ISBN 0143020234 Alice Ferry, narrator and co-protagonist of Maurice Gee’s new novel, is a mycologist – an expert on fungi. That is, her professional life is devoted to studying spongy, fragile, morbid life-forms that lurk…
Making Ends Meet: Essays and Talks 1992-2004 Ian Wedde Victoria University Press, $39.95, ISBN 086473503 In the title essay of this wonderful collection, originally given as a talk on issues of research and archiving at the National Library of New…
A Short History of Paradise Norman Bilbrough Penguin, $28.00, ISBN 0143020358 Kissing Shadows Renée Huia, $34.99, ISBN 1869692039 How often can one say of local fiction, and mean it, that it’s an absolute delight to read? Known as a writer…
Hibiscus Coast Paula Morris Penguin, $28.00, ISBN 0143019767 The Fossil Pits Tim Corballis Victoria University Press, $29.95, ISBN 0864735081 With her debut novel, Queen of Beauty, Paula Morris won both the 2001 Adam Foundation Prize for Creative Writing and the…
How to Catch a Fish Kevin Ireland Awa Press, $24.99, ISBN 0958253862 How to Drink a Glass of Wine John Saker Awa Press, $24.99, ISBN 095823582X Discussing Aldous Huxley’s On the Margin in his 2002 biography of that now untrendy…
A Box of Bees Emily Dobson Victoria University Press, $17.95, ISBN 0864735103 As It Was in the Beginning Stu Bagby Steele Roberts, $19.95, ISBN 1877338540 Raw Places John Horrocks Steele Roberts, $19.95, ISBN 1877338451 Who can deny the bliss of…
Last Words: Approaches to Death in New Zealand’s Cultures and Faiths ed Margot Schwass Bridget Williams Books, $29.99, ISBN 1877242349 The primary school my daughter attends has one of the most ethnically and culturally diverse populations in the New Zealand…
The quality question, Chris Else
New Zealand Society of Authors president Chris Else examines the options for funding a home-grown literature. In offering his radical rethink of Creative New Zealand’s policy for funding literature (NZB, December 2005), Tim Hazledine suggests the only reasonable justification for…
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