Blog Archives

Keeping it in the family, Tina Shaw

Necessary Secrets Greg McGee Upstart Press, $38.00, ISBN 9781988516639 Loving Sylvie Elizabeth Smither Allen and Unwin, $37.00, ISBN 9781988547114 Two recently-published novels explore inter-generational stories, yet there couldn’t be two more different treatments. (more…)
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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

The good, the bad and the ugly, John O’Leary

Scoundrels and Eccentrics of the Pacific John Dunmore Upstart Press, $40.00, ISBN 9781988516219 William Deans: The Passionate Pioneer Louise Deans Wily Publications, $35.00, ISBN: 9781927167342 Just as Australia’s Outback has its “characters” (according to popular legend, at least), so that…
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Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review

Secrets of the All Blacks not all that secret, Spiro Zavos

The Jersey: The Secrets Behind the World’s Most Successful Team Peter Bills Pan Macmillan, $38.00, ISBN 9781509856688 Murdoch: The All Black Who Never Returned Ron Palenski Upstart Press, $40.00, ISBN 9781988516127 The cultural historian E H McCormick once noted that…
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Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sport

Darkening and deepening, Catherine Robertson

Through the Lonesome Dark Paddy Richardson Upstart Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781927262986 Paddy Richardson takes a risk with her latest novel. By setting it in Blackball, a mining town on the West Coast in the early 1900s, she raises expectations of…
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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Fascinating threesome, Rosemary Wildblood

Obsession Elspeth Sandys Upstart Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781927262900 Set mostly in the 1980s, Elspeth Sandys’s Obsession explores the dynamics of a relationship fuelled by desire and driven by a symbiotic need for intimacy. The narrative is purportedly written by a…
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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Love and war, Murray Bramwell

Love as a Stranger Owen Marshall Vintage, $38.00, ISBN 9781775538578 The Antipodeans Greg McGee Upstart Press, $38.00, ISBN 9781927262030 In his captivating new novel, Love as a Stranger, Owen Marshall immediately greets the reader with portents. The epigraph quotes the…
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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Tipping points, Sylvan Thomson

First Lady – From Boyhood to Womanhood: The Incredible Story of New Zealand’s Sex-change Pioneer  Liz Roberts with Alison Mau Upstart Press, $40.00, ISBN 9781927262375 Sexual Cultures in Aotearoa New Zealand Education Alexandra C Gunn and Lee A Smith (eds)…
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Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

From the sidelines, Michele A’Court

Dan Carter: My Story Dan Carter with Duncan Greive Upstart Press, $50.00 ISBN 9781927262382 Here’s a crazy idea – get someone who doesn’t give a toss about rugby to review the autobiography of the world’s greatest rugby union fly-half. Madness.…
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Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review, Sport

Acts political, Vanda Symon

Fallout Paul Thomas Upstart Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781927262016 Where the Dead Men Go Liam McIlvanney Faber & Faber, $25.00, ISBN 9780571239863 New Zealand crime fiction is going from strength to strength, with great work being published by old favourites as…
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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
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