Blog Archives

Imaginative “factionality”, Lawrence Jones

Posted on March 26, 2000 by NZ Books

Talking About O’Dwyer C K Stead Penguin Books, $24.95, ISBN 0 14 028839 2 When C K Stead delivered his paper “Narrativity, or the Birth of the Story” at the AULLA Conference in Dunedin in February 1993, he received probably…

Tagged with: C K Stead, Issue 42, Lawrence Jones, Penguin Books
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

More realist than feminist, Lawrence Jones

Posted on March 16, 1999 by NZ Books

The Best of Fiona Kidman’s Short Stories Vintage, $29.95, ISBN 1 86941 350 4 Some years ago I was judge for the Bank of New Zealand Katherine Mansfield Awards, and one of the best stories entered, one that made my short…

Tagged with: Fiona Kidman, Issue 37, Lawrence Jones, Vintage
Posted in Literature, Review, Short stories

Drowning in psychic storms, Lawrence Jones

Posted on June 5, 1998 by NZ Books

The Lifeboat Graham Billing Cape Catley, $27.95, ISBN 0908561 68 7 “Quite the most curious of the recent crop of New Zealand fiction” (Kevin Ireland, Listener); “an intense, demanding, cryptic novel by one of our most respected but enigmatic writers”…

Tagged with: Cape Catley, Graham Billing, Issue 33, Lawrence Jones
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Surprising ourselves, Lawrence Jones

Posted on October 30, 1996 by NZ Books

Loving Ways Maurice Gee Penguin, $29.95, ISBN 0 140 25789 6 Little Masters Damien Wilkins VUP, $24.95, ISBN 0 86473 298 8 The reader of Loving Ways will quickly recognise family resemblances to earlier Gee novels. The structure within two chapters…

Tagged with: Autumn 1996, Damien Wilkins, Issue 25, Lawrence Jones, Maurice Gee, Penguin Books, Victoria University Press
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Time of energy and change, Howard Warner

Posted on March 17, 1996 by NZ Books

The Picador Book of Contemporary New Zealand Fiction Fergus Barrowman (ed) Picador $24.95 ISBN 0330 339966 From the Mainland: An Anthology of South Island Writing Lawrence Jones and Heather Murray (eds) Godwit $29.95 ISBN 0908877 501 Between the publishing histories…

Tagged with: Fergus Barrowman, Godwit, Heather Murray, Howard Warner, Issue 22, Lawrence Jones, Picador
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Short stories

Local practice v wider trends, Stuart Murray

Posted on October 7, 1995 by NZ Books

Opening the Book: New Essays on New Zealand Writing Mark Williams and Michele Leggott (eds) Auckland University Press, $39.95, ISBN 1869401158 Ending the Silences: Critical Essays on the Works of Maurice Shadbolt Ralph J Crane (ed) Hodder Moa Beckett, $24.95,…

Tagged with: Auckland University Press, Heather Murray, Hodder Moa Beckett, Issue 20, Lawrence Jones, Mark Williams, Maurice Shadbolt, Michele Leggott, Ralph J Crane, Stuart Murray, Summer 1995, University of Otago English Department
Posted in Literature, Review

Most significant work in NZ realism, Lawrence Jones

Posted on September 13, 1994 by NZ Books

Crime Story Maurice Gee Penguin, $29.95 The Fat Man Maurice Gee Viking, $15.95 In 1977, writing a letter to the Listener, Maurice Shadbolt commented that although he was “far more interested as a writer, in nineteenth century New Zealand”, he…

Tagged with: Issue 15, Lawrence Jones, Maurice Gee, Spring 1994, Viking
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Rich repertoire, Lawrence Jones

Posted on September 1, 1992 by NZ Books

Tomorrow We Save the Orphans Owen Marshall, John McIndoe, Dunedin, 1992, $24.95 Last year as I was working through a huge box of anonymous entries to the Bank of New Zealand Katherine Mansfield Award competition, I came across an ill‑typed,…

Tagged with: Issue 6, John McIndoe, Lawrence Jones, Owen Marshall, Spring 1992
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Significant short stories, Lawrence Jones

Posted on July 1, 1992 by NZ Books

Past Light Catherine Delahunty, Penguin, Auckland, 1992, $24.95 Dangerous Desires Peter Wells, Reed Pacific Writers Series, Auckland, 1991, $24.95 Everyday Life in Paradise Ian Richards, Godwit, Auckland, 1991, $24.95 Activity in the New Zealand short story has been intense recently,…

Tagged with: Catherine Delahunty, Godwit, Ian Richards, Lawrence Jones, Penguin, Peter Wells, Reed Pacific Writers Series
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Short stories

Honest and substantial, W S Broughton

Posted on March 1, 1992 by NZ Books

Barbed Wire and Mirrors: Essays on New Zealand prose Lawrence Jones, Second edition, University of Otago Press (distrib John McIndoe Ltd, Dunedin), 1991, $39.95 Lawrence Jones has been writing about New Zealand fiction for at least twenty-five years now, and…

Tagged with: Autumn 1992, Issue 4, Lawrence Jones, Otago University Press, W S Broughton
Posted in Literature