Beyond Betrayal, Trouble in the Promised Land – Restoring the Mission to Maori Keith Newman Penguin, $45.00, ISBN 9780143570516 Most Maori I know have a different view of the past to the nation-building rhetoric that inhabits the majority of mainstream…
The Mijo Tree Janet Frame (Deidre Copeland illus) Penguin, $25.00, ISBN 9780143569428 A Book is a Book Jenny Bornholdt (Sarah Wilkins illus) Gecko Press, $25.00, ISBN 9781877579929 Dunger Joy Cowley Gecko Press, $20.00, ISBN 9781977579462 Janet Frame sent the typescript…
On Song: Stories behind New Zealand’s Pop Classics Simon Sweetman Penguin Books, $65.00, ISBN 9780143568162 Any anthology is a work of exclusion, constructed to emphasise or establish a particular narrative. In the case of anthologist Simon Sweetman’s On Song: Stories…
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…
The Occupiers: New Zealand Veterans Remember Post-war Japan Alison Parr Penguin Books, $45.00, ISBN 9780143567240 In Love and War: Kiwi Soldiers’ Romantic Encounters in Wartime Italy Susan Jacobs Penguin Books, $40.00, ISBN 9780143567554 I detoured into these two books while…
Collecting Cooper Paul Cleave Penguin Books, $35.00, ISBN 9780143568025 The Laughterhouse Paul Cleave Penguin Books, $38.00, ISBN 9780143568292 The Faceless Vanda Symon Penguin Books, $30.00, ISBN 9780143567202 By Any Means Ben Sanders HarperCollins, $24.99, ISBN 9781869508777 New Zealand crime fiction…
Guns and Utu: A Short History of the Musket Wars Matthew Wright Penguin Books, $42.00, ISBN 9780143565659 From the time the first accounts of New Zealand’s native inhabitants began to reach Europe, Maori pugnacity and military prowess have featured high…
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…
Kakapo: Rescued from the Brink of Extinction Alison Ballance Craig Potton Publishing, $49.99, ISBN 9781877517273 The Tasman: Biography of an Ocean Neville Peat Penguin Books, $62.00, ISBN 9780143011385 Time was when “non-fiction” meant staid, largely black-and-white books on a…
Travesty Mike Johnson (graphic art, Darren Sheehan) Titus Books, $39.00, ISBN 9781877441134 Fosterling Emma Neale Vintage, $29.99, ISBN 9781869794859 Wulf Hamish Clayton Penguin Books, $30.00, ISBN 9780143206491 Like many futuristic nightmares, the naming of the nihilistic Gaia…