Linda Burgess Mazarine by Charlotte Grimshaw (Vintage, 2018), 288 pp., $38 Frances’ daughter Maya is travelling in Europe and hasn’t contacted her mother for two and a half weeks. Maya’s friends and colleagues are disconcertingly evasive. When going for a walk with her dog, Frances meets her ex, who’s never usually in this part of […]
River of Truths
Rajorshi Chakraborti False River by Paula Morris (Penguin Random House, 2017), 288 pp., $35 Among the many delights, for me, of reading Paula Morris’s wonderful, unclassifiable prose collection, False River, was the recurrent sensation of being reminded of other incredible writers, of feeling Roberto Bolaño suddenly close by, or Patricia Highsmith, or Joyce, or the […]
To the Sanitorium
Denis Harold Rotoroa by Amy Head (Victoria University Press, 2018), 248 pp., $30 Amy Head’s first novel Rotoroa is at times beguiling and vivid in its evocation of New Zealand’s repressed social milieu after World War II. Through the eyes and occasionally the consciousness of several main characters, Head traces undercurrents of change toward more […]
A Man’s Work
James McNaughton The Man Who Would Not See by Rajorshi Chakraborti (Penguin, 2018), 335 pp., $38 Rajorshi Chakraborti is an essayist, novelist and short-story writer with an international reputation. He grew up in Calcutta and Mumbai and has lived, studied and worked in Canada, England and Scotland. He now lives in Wellington, where The Man […]
It Takes a Community to Catch a Murderer
Jennifer Lawn Marlborough Man by Alan Carter (Fremantle Press, 2017), 304 pp., $37 This is a cracker of a novel, pacey and sharp. It opens with a scene from every parent’s nightmare: swimming lessons are over, children spill out from the pool, and as a little boy makes his way towards the bus stop a […]
‘We hardly know what to make of them.’
Chris Else The Cage by Lloyd Jones (Penguin-Random House, 2018), 262 pp., $38 This year’s shortlist for the Acorn Prize includes an anomaly. Three of the titles show an attention to the values of ‘fine writing’ that have tended to dominate our recent new fiction. The New Animals by rising star Pip Adams plays fast […]
Barricades, Bewilderment, Bravado and Bravery
Carolyn McCurdie Instant Messages by Laura Solomon (Proverse Hong Kong, 2010), 168 pp., $24; Taking Wainui by Laura Solomon (Woven Words Publishers OPC Pvt. Ltd., 2017), 138 pp., $15; Brain Graft by Laura Solomon (Proverse Hong Kong, 2017), 55 pp., np. Laura Solomon’s fiction, poetry and non-fiction have been published widely, both in New Zealand […]
‘What if we want to forget?’
Kiran Dass Sodden Downstream by Brannavan Gnanalingam (Lawrence & Gibson, 2018), 180 pp., $28.99 Brannavan Gnanalingam’s fifth novel Sodden Downstream is an immensely affecting and at times quietly upsetting read. Set over a roughly twenty-hours period in Lower Hutt, it takes place as former tropical cyclone Evelyn hits Wellington and the Kapiti Coast, causing the […]
Stone Dust and Cherry Stains
Craig Cliff Beneath Pale Water by Thalia Henry (Cloud Ink Press, 2017), 244 pp., $29.95 On the back cover of Thalia Henry’s debut novel Beneath Pale Water, Owen Marshall offers the following endorsement: ‘Powerfully evokes the landscapes and seasons of inland Otago.’ To the cynic, those nine words might read like a nice person struggling […]
With Whom Should We Quarrel If We Disagree?
Kate Duignan The Necessary Angel by C.K. Stead (Allen and Unwin, 2017), 204 pp., $36 The Necessary Angel tells, on the face of it, a story about woman problems. Max Jackson, New Zealand-born professor of literature at the Sorbonne in Paris, ricochets between three women: his semi-estranged wife Louse; Helen, a student with a crush […]
Serious in Intent, Playful in Manner
Simone Oettli-van Delden Sleeps Standing Moetū by Witi Ihimaera with Hēmi Kelly (Vintage, 2017), 221 pp., $35 This book defies simple definition. Its inputs are multiple. Primarily it is a book about the Battle of Ōrākau, the final and decisive onslaught of the Waikato land wars, in which 300 Māori men, women and children are […]
Turning Blue
Breton Dukes Low Life by Michael Botur (Createspace, 2017), 244 pp., $27.99; Fresh Ink by multiple authors (Cloud Ink Press, 2017), 224 pp., $28 It’s a tough time to be writing short stories in New Zealand. Anecdotally, we hear collections aren’t selling well. Competitions have disappeared or had prize money slashed (the Katherine Mansfield and […]
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