Blog Archives

What’s a New Zealand novel? Sue Esterman

Posted on June 10, 2016 by NZ Books

Enemy Camp
David Hill
Puffin, $20.00, ISBN 9780143309123

Lullaby
Bernard Beckett
Text, $26.00, ISBN 9781922182753

Open Your Eyes, Jackson Ryder
Rudy Castaneda Lopez
Escalator, $30.00, ISBN 9780473295691

It has been interesting to read three such different but compelling books. All three writers are New Zealanders, but only one book is identifiable as a New Zealand novel. I mention this only because there was a session at the recent Writers Week in Wellington during the Arts Festival where I was expecting a robust discussion about what constitutes a New Zealand writer but unfortunately that didn’t happen. So the question is still there, but I don’t think I can address that in this review except through an occasional comment.

Tagged with: Bernard Beckett, David Hill, Escalator Press, Issue 114, Puffin, Rudy Castaneda Lopez, Sue Esterman, Text, Winter 2016
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review, Young adults

Paranoia, violence and moral reckoning, Hamish Clayton

Posted on December 5, 2013 by NZ Books

The Quiet Earth Craig Harrison Text, $16.00, ISBN 9781922147059 Over the last few years Melbourne-based Text Publishing has done a good job of bringing back to mainstream attention some of the “lost marvels of our literature”, republishing books that count…

Tagged with: Craig Harrison, Hamish Clayton, Issue 104, Summer 2013, Text
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Literary dreams, Elspeth Sandys

Posted on June 1, 2013 by NZ Books

In the Memorial Room Janet Frame Text, $35.00, ISBN 9781922147134 It will come as no surprise to readers of Janet Frame’s work that this hitherto unpublished novel is, before anything else, an examination of language, and the slippery, unreliable character…

Tagged with: Elspeth Sandys, Issue 102, Janet Frame, Text, Winter 2013
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Eminent people and unmade beds, Ann Beaglehole

Posted on March 1, 2013 by NZ Books

My Life in Two Halves: A Memoir Betty Gilderdale David Bateman, $30.00, ISBN 978186953832 Before I Forget Jacqueline Fahey Auckland University Press, $45.00, ISBN 9781869405816 The Lost Woman Sydney Smith Text, $40.00, ISBN 9781921922480 Freud, who supposedly said that he…

Tagged with: Ann Beaglehole, Auckland University Press, Autumn 2013, Betty Gilderdale, David Bateman, Issue 101, Jacqueline Fahey, Sydney Smith, Text
Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review