Blog Archives

Nasty things people do, Bernard Carpinter

The Temptations of Frederick Weld Michael Wall Black Swan, $26.95, ISBN 1869415930 Devil’s Apple Simon Snow Black Swan, $26.95, ISBN 1869415477 The Monstrance David McGill Silver Owl Press, $24.95, ISBN 095824510X Chicane Colin D Peel HarperCollins, $21.99, ISBN 1869504887 Alternative

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Paradise or purgatory, Alan Knowles

John Kinder’s New Zealand Ron Brownson (with contributions from Peter Shaw, Michael Dunn and Roger Blackley) Godwit and Auckland Art Gallery, $49.95, ISBN 1869621077 John Kinder turned his back on taunts of religious inflexibility and charges of being a “stiff-necked”

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Posted in Art, Non-fiction, Photography, Review

A wink to the grown-ups, Gavin Bishop

The Night Kite Peter Bland, illustrations by Carl Bland, Mallinson Rendel, $24.95, ISBN 0908783833 Napoleon and the Chicken Farmer Lloyd Jones, illustrations by Graeme Gash, Mallinson Rendel, $29.95, ISBN 0908783752 Cat’s Whiskers – 4 Favourite Lynley Dodd Stories Lynley Dodd

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Posted in Children, Literature, Review

Cabinet of curiosities, Roger Blackley

Icons Nga Taonga: From the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa Te Papa curatorial team Te Papa Press, $79.99, ISBN 090901096X On a recent visit from his Tasmanian hideaway, art museum guru Daniel Thomas expressed amazement that Te Papa’s

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Posted in Art, History, Non-fiction, Review

An end to the “musket wars”, Rawiri Taonui

Taua – Musket wars, land wars, or tikanga? Warfare in Maori society in the early nineteenth century Angela Ballara Penguin, $59.95, ISBN 0143018892 Reviewing R D Crosby’s The Musket Wars: A History of Inter-iwi Conflict 1806-1845 (New Zealand Books, March

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Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review

Earthquakes and adulteries, John Horrocks

Good Luck Anna Livesey Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 086473459X The Adulterer’s Bible Cliff Fell Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 0864734603 Both these collections of poetry come from recent graduates of  Victoria University’s creative writing programme. The publisher is Victoria

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Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review

Southern woman, Anne Else

Sites of Gender: Women, men and modernity in Southern Dunedin, 1890-1939 ed Barbara Brookes, Annabel Cooper, and Robin Law Auckland University Press, $45.00, ISBN 1869403010 More than half the women of south Dunedin – over twice the proportion for New

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Posted in Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review

Here’s looking at you, kid, John O’Connor

Gallery: A Selection Mark Pirie Salt Publishing, $29.95, ISBN 1876857242 Toku Tinihanga: Selected Poems 1982-2002 Michael O’Leary HeadworX, $26.95, ISBN 0473090066 Walking the Land Kevin Ireland Hazard Press, $21.95, ISBN 1877270520 We live in the age of celebrity. This has

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Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review

Taking to the air, Janet Hughes

Rosalie Gascoigne: Plain Air City Gallery/Victoria University Press, $49.95, ISBN 0864734727 As I shelved Rosalie Gascoigne: Plain Air among my treasured collection of exhibition catalogues, it set me thinking about the reasons we buy catalogues, and the various pleasures they

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Posted in Art, Non-fiction, Review

Editorial – Issue 64

Catering for the “common reader” The October 1991 issue of New Zealand Books reviewed 6 titles. Twelve years and 57 issues later, the figure was almost exactly the same: NZB October 2003 covered 38 new books. So what’s changed? Certainly

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Posted in Editorial
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