Blog Archives

Lies, damned lies, and fiction, Mark Broatch

False River Paula Morris Penguin, $35.00 ISBN 9780143771630 A couple of years ago I asked English essayist and novelist Geoff Dyer if he thought a man he and his wife picked up while driving through a desert in the United…
Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Walking in more than one world, Paula Morris

Being Chinese Helene Wong Bridget Williams Books, $40.00, ISBN 9780947492380 Going Places: Migration, Economics and the Future of New Zealand Julie Fry and Hayden Glass BWB Texts, $15.00, ISBN 9780947492694 The First Migration: Maori Origins 3000 BC – AD 1450…
Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

Supporting a long-haul life of writing, Paula Morris

Paula Morris (Ngati Wai), fiction writer and essayist, presents the Academy of New Zealand Literature/Te Whare Mātātuhi o Aotearoa. Last year, when I returned to New Zealand after too many years away in the United Kingdom and United States of…
Tagged with: , ,
Posted in Comment

Looking for home, David Cohen

Barefoot Years Martin Edmond Bridget Williams Books, $15.00, ISBN 9781927277676 On Coming Home Paula Morris Bridget Williams Books, $15.00, ISBN 9780908321117 Somewhere in the course of his perceptive career, in what one assumes was a more or less idle moment,…
Tagged with: , , , , ,
Posted in Essays, Non-fiction, Review

The place where stories begin, Paula Morris

Chappy Patricia Grace Penguin, $38.00, ISBN 9780143572398 It’s over a decade since Patricia Grace’s last novel, the moving, cinematic Tu – an ambitious book about war and its temptations, adventures and devastations for the men who went and the families…
Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Sex-free romance and YA cred, Paula Morris

Bugs Whiti Hereaka Huia, $25.00, ISBN 9781775501336 When We Wake Karen Healey Allen & Unwin, $22.00, ISBN 9781742378084 Awakening Natalie King Penguin, $20.00, ISBN 9780143570790 Bugs, the eponymous protagonist of Whiti Hereaka’s first YA novel, is unimpressed with much of…
Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review, Young adults

How they probably thought, Nicholas Reid

Rangatira Paula Morris Penguin Books, $30.00, ISBN 978014565758   What is the value to us of historical novels? They are valuable only when they try to reconstruct the mentality of the past. Second-rate historical novels dress up modern characters in…
Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

“Awesome”. Or not — Paula Morris

Paula Morris works hard at presenting reviewers with the other cheek.  It’s 10 years since I wrote my first novel, Queen of Beauty, which makes it nine years since the book was published, and I started getting reviews. Only nine…
Tagged with: , ,
Posted in Comment

Tea and sympathy, Paula Morris

Lola Elizabeth Smither Penguin Books, $30.00, ISBN 9780143203650 Elizabeth Smither’s last novel was called Different Kinds of Pleasure, and its title offers a clue to the approach she takes in her fiction, and also to what she expects of her…
Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

The uncomfortable and the familiar, Hamish Clayton

The Penguin Book of Contemporary New Zealand Short Stories Paula Morris (ed) Penguin Books, $40.00, ISBN 9780143006817 A new collection of contemporary New Zealand short stories from Penguin, edited by one of our foremost authors, surely signifies an important publishing…
Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Literature, Review, Short stories
Search the archive

More results...

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Filter by Categories
Architecture
Art
Autobiography
Awards
Biography
Byline
Children
Comment
Contents
ebooks
Economics
Editorial
Education
Essays
Extract
Fiction
Gender
Graphic novel
Health
History
Imprints
Language
Lecture
Letters
Letters
Literature
Māori
Media
Memoir
Music
Natural History
Non-fiction
Obituaries
Opinion
Pacific
Photography
Plays
Poem
Poetry
Politics & Law
Psychology
Religion
Review
Science
Short stories
Sociology
Sport
War
YA Reviewers
Young adults
Recent issues: subscriber-only access

    Subscribe to NZ Books to access the issues above

    Search by category