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Wading in the waters, Sam Mahon

Beyond Manapouri: 50 Years of Environmental Politcs in New Zealand
Catherine Knight
Canterbury University Press, $40.00,
ISBN 9781988503042

The battle to preserve our waters in this country has left us, as a nation, almost as bruised and divided as we were during the Springbok tour. There is a moment in the middle of any maelstrom in which you wonder how you got there; by which wrong move; by courtesy of whose malevolent god in particular. As if in answer, Catherine Knight has elegantly traced the evolution of environmental politics from Manapouri in 1972 to the Ruataniwha dam 30 years later. It is an overlay of torn landscapes, muddied waters, greed and broken hearts; it is a paean of lost opportunities.

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Posted in Natural History, Non-fiction, Review

A view from afar, Simon Upton

My Father’s Shadow: A Portrait of Justice Peter Mahon Sam Mahon Longacre Press, $39.99, ISBN 9781877460173 I like Sam Mahon’s writerly qualities. This book confirms the literary reputation inaugurated with The Year of the Horse and broadened with delicious malice

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Posted in Biography, Memoir, Non-fiction, Review

Watering down debate, Simon Upton

The Water Thieves Sam Mahon Longacre Press, $34.99, ISBN 1877361518 New Zealand is a largely debate-free zone.  A couple of years ago, I co-authored an article on the Resource Management Act. Three of us – a partner in a national

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Posted in Memoir, Non-fiction, Review

Staying in the saddle, Kim Griggs

The Year of the Horse Sam Mahon Longacre, $34.95, ISBN 1877135739 In The Year of the Horse, sculptor Sam Mahon recounts the year he spent making of a life-sized bronze sculpture of a horse and rider, the archetypal Southern Man,

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Posted in Art, Memoir, Non-fiction, Review
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