Why Bob Dylan Matters to Author Richard Thomas
“It took six months for New Zealander Richard Thomas to draft the manuscript for his newest book, Why Bob Dylan Matters, a study, among other things, of the songwriter’s deep and abiding connection to…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
How to Win the Man Booker Prize
The upstairs room of an indie bookstore. A book launch for a local author. Crisps and wine are being handed out, a buzz is in the air, congratulations are showered upon the young writer….
Author Lynley Dodd on the Secret Lives of Pets
On the release of her new picture book, Scarface Claw, Hold Tight! acclaimed New Zealand writer and illustrator Lynley Dodd talks animal antics and her favourite children’s books. Many cat owners would be familiar with…
Lynley Dodd’s Scarface Set Loose Again
New Zealand’s favourite scrappy cat returns, taking the ride of his life in author Lynley Dodd’s latest adventure, Scarface Claw, Hold Tight. Dodd is bringing the book to Perth’s Awesome Festival along with a free…
Ruth Park’s Words Endeared Her to Australia
In the 1940s, many people resented the fact that a New Zealander was telling Australians about slums that many denied even existed. But author Ruth Park had been living in a run-down part of…
Paul Cleave Discusses New Killer Novel
Christchurch-born Paul Cleave, 42, is a relative newcomer to United States audiences. Although his first book, The Cleaner, was published in 2006 and sold half a million copies, his books weren’t marketed in the…
Patricia Grace on Telling the Stories of Maori
Born in Wellington, 80 years ago, Patricia Grace is one of New Zealand’s most important writers, CBC Radio Canada writes. Her stories are inspired by her experiences growing up as the daughter of a…
New Zealand Poets Taking on the World
If poetry makes you think of stuffy classrooms and impenetrable verse, think again. The BBC’s Holly Williams takes a look at the female poets revolutionising the art form, including New Zealand-based Lang Leav and…
Alan Brough Making the Kids Laugh in Benalla
New Zealand-born comedian and children’s book author Alan Brough, who is best known to Australians as one of the team leaders on television’s Spicks and Specks musical quiz programme, was in Benalla, Victoria recently…
Writers Contingent Takes NZ to Edinburgh
Poets Courtney Sina Meredith and Hera Lindsay Bird, as well as writer Sarah Laing, make up a contingent of local talent taking New Zealand to the Edinburgh International Book Festival…
Author Julie Parsons Makes Punchy Return
New Zealand-born but long-time resident in Ireland, Julie Parsons boasts a CV more varied than the average author. As well as producing five previous crime novels, she’s worked as a radio and TV producer…
Gina Inverarity’s Children’s Book Uplifts
Wellington children’s author, Gina Inverarity’s new book The Brown Dog is reviewed by Stephen Romei for The Australian. The Brown Dog is illustrated by Australian Greg Holfeld. “‘The brown dog turned up one rainy Saturday afternoon,’…
Life Coach Despina Nicola Dared to Begin
New Zealand-born life coach and author Despina Nicola says we are the product of our choices – which is pretty hard-hitting stuff for anyone who’s overwhelmed and looking for someone to blame. But then…
New Ben Sanders Novel an Engrossing Chase Story
“In earlier Ben Sanders books, Marshall Grade worked undercover for the NYPD. When he made serious enemies in the criminal subculture, the federal cops hid him far away in the witness protection programme,” Toronto…
This is Shannon Cullen’s Journal for Mothers
When New Zealand-born Shannon Cullen had her first baby Matilda, who is now aged four, she found herself writing down random notes and doodles at all hours. This sparked the creation of
Eleanor Catton’s New Novel a Psychological Thriller
Eleanor Catton, the youngest ever Booker-prize winning author, has sold the rights to her third novel, a psychological thriller set in rural New Zealand where super-rich foreigners face off with ragtag locals on the…
Lang Leav’s Debut Novel Sad Girls out in May
International bestselling author New Zealander Lang Leav, known for her titles Love & Misadventure, Lullabies, Memories and The Universe of Us, is set to debut as a novelist this year. Leav recently took to
Ashleigh Young Wins Major Literary Prize
It is the kind of news we all dream of receiving, but New Zealand author and poet Ashleigh Young, 33, thought it was a hoax when told she’d receive more than $200,000 from one…
Everyone Should Read This Fairy Tale
“Promised Land, a new children’s book that encourages LGBTQ acceptance (not to mention smashes any taboo around the subject) is so powerful,” Kaleigh Fasanella writes for Teen Vogue. “New Zealand-based authors, Adam Reynolds and…
Author Paul Feenstra on Reading the Signs
Wellington-born-turned-Long-Beach-resident author Paul Feenstra said a “No Trespassing” sign was the start of his new career in historical fiction writing. On a visit to New Zealand in 2009 after more than 25 years away, Feenstra…
Why US Poet James Galvin Is like New Zealand
American poet James Galvin’s “Why I Am Like New Zealand” featured in the New York Times recently. Why I Am Like New Zealand My feet stick out from beneath the sheet, Pointing to where death thrives. I am…
Hera Lindsay Bird Takes Poetry Beyond the Bookstore
In New Zealand, poetry’s latest “it girl”, Hera Lindsay Bird, is amassing a semi-cult online following for her smart, sassy and explicit takes on everything from female sexuality to Friends. Bird, along with contemporaries…
World Fantasy Award for Novelist Anna Smaill
Author Anna Smaill’s debut The Chimes won best novel at the 2016 World Fantasy Awards in Ohio, United States, a “wonderful honour”, the Victoria University lecturer said. “I’m really happy. The authors on the shortlist…
Heavy Metal Drummer Reprints WW2 Book
New Zealand-born author and musician Lawrence Paterson has recently reprinted his fourth book, Hitler’s Grey Wolves: U-Boats In The Indian Ocean, which originally came out in 2004 and explores the forty German submarines that…
Gunn Returns to the Bush
Award-winning novelist and short story writer Kirsty Gunn returns to the New Zealand of her childhood in Going Bush (Sylph Editions) and My Katherine Mansfield Project (New York Review Books). Gunn, who lives in…
Frances Harrison Recounts Flipside of French Dream
Life in France is not always la belle vie that expats had hoped for when making the “dream move”. New Zealand-born Frances Harrison, English teacher and author of Follow My Heart: Risking it all…
Author Joan Druett Conjures up the Seven Seas
If you love stories of sailing, adventure, the vast Pacific, navigation, or other such things Marianas Variety writer B C Cook wants to introduce you to one of his favourite authors, New Zealand maritime…
Katherine Mansfield’s Inscrutability Intrigues
In the acclaimed biography La Vida Breve di Katherine Mansfield, written by famed Italian literary critic and author Pietro Citati, the New Zealand-born writer’s stories are described as having the special quality of “distance”….
New Zealand’s Most Exciting Young Poet
Hera Lindsay Bird, who “has become a cult favourite for her explicit, cutting and often funny writing” was “catapulted from respected but anonymous graduate writer to semi-cult status” after publishing her first book of…
Witi Ihimaera on Writers and the Conscience
Gisborne-born author Witi Ihimaera, 72, feels the real role of a writer is to become the conscience of the nation and that Indian writers have set a “fantastic example” by using literature to address…
Scotland Inspires Who’s Afraid? Author Maria Lewis
When New Zealand-born TV host Maria Lewis was penning her debut urban fantasy novel, Who’s Afraid? from her desk in Sydney, she surprised many by setting the story 11,000 miles away in Dundee, Scotland’s Daily…
Poet Hera Lyndsay Bird Speaks to a Generation
Millions are turning to poetry in response to a year of troubling news stories – with previously excluded voices, like Thames-born writer Hera Lyndsay Bird, in the field now going viral, the Guardian’s Rhiannon…
Judith Hereford Pens Book Focusing on Elderly Care
New Zealand-born Judith Hereford, who lives in Herefordshire in the UK, may be over the age of 70, but that isn’t stopping her from taking on the publishing world with her first self-penned book,…
Courtney Sina Meredith Doing What She Loves
Fear can block our creativity or turn our creative practice mediocre. So what makes some artists “fearless”? New Zealander poet, playwright, fiction writer and musician Courtney Sina Meredith, 30, has a reputation as a…
Author Damien Wilkins’ Novel Max Gate Tantalises
Lower Hutt-born author Damien Wilkins’ “surprising” novel Max Gate, which explores the question of why novelist Thomas Hardy’s body was buried in Westminster Abbey and his heart in Dorset, is reviewed in the Daily…
Books that Shaped Author Hannah Tunnicliffe
New Zealand-born author Hannah Tunnicliffe, a self-confessed nomad, who has lived in Canada, Australia, England and Macau, writes the blog Fork and Fiction, about food, family and books. With the publication of her third novel…
Ronald Syme’s The Roman Republic a Masterpiece
New Zealander Sir Ronald Syme’s The Roman Revolution, written under the cloud of fascism, is a compelling account of the decline of the Roman oligarchy in favour of a principate, according to author Joseph…
Writer Maria Lewis Outdoes Tarantino
New Zealand-born journalist and author Maria Lewis has morphed from a crime reporter on the Gold Coast to pop-culture extraordinaire, has nabbed an international publishing deal and caught Quentin Tarantino’s attention, all by the…
Blair Reeve’s New Children’s Book a Classic
Hong Kong-based New Zealander Blair Reeve, who mentors students at Chinese University in creative writing, has just published children’s book Hogart the Hedgehog Turns Nink, “an enormously fun book, and a gratifying one to…
Translator Max Bickerton’s Haiku Legacy Discussed
“In the 1930s, a translator of Japanese literature from New Zealand was jailed and tortured by the Japanese police. His name was Max Bickerton or, more fully, William Maxwell Bickerton,” Japanese poet and translator…
Owls Do Cry Continues to Astonish 60 Years On
The “modern masterpiece” Owls Do Cry, written by New Zealand author Janet Frame in 1957, “about siblings struggling with money, health and grief still has the power to unnerve and astonish,” writes Claire Hazelton…
Owls Do Cry Reissued with Margaret Drabble Intro
Janet Frame’s 1957 debut novel Owls Do Cry has now been reissued with a nuanced and appreciative introduction by Margaret Drabble, who calls the novel “an exhilarating and dazzling prelude to long and…
Ben Sanders’ Crime Novel Takes on the Big Guns
Ben Sanders’ American Blood is a “world-class thriller,” according to Karen Hardy writing for the Sydney Morning Herald. “It’s perhaps a little too soon to put Sanders in the same league as Lee Child,”…
Legions of Fans Greet Author Lang Leav in KL
Best-selling poet and author Lang Leav’s cult following of devoted fans from all over the world, began with her poetry being shared by millions on Tumblr and eventually culminated with the publication…
Nabokov Biographer Boyd Delivers Letters to Véra
University of Auckland Professor and definitive Vladimir Nabokov biographer Brian Boyd this month published Letters to Véra, the first complete volume of the author’s letters to his wife. Edited and…
Janet Frame Travels Home Around the World
Janet Frame’s 1963 novella Towards Another Summer reimagines the New Zealand author’s “roots crisis” and is a sharp drama of fleeing, and missing, home, Catherine Taylor writes for the Guardian. The novella’s theme – taking…
Incredulous Anna Smaill on Booker Nomination
One of three debut writers on the Man Booker longlist, 35-year-old Anna Smaill will be unfamiliar to all but the most avid reader of contemporary fiction: her previous publication is a volume of poetry,…
New Zealander Makes Booker Prize Longlist
New Zealand author Anna Smaill has been longlisted for the £50,000 Man Booker Prize with her debut novel The Chimes. “Just dropped in to check my email before bed and … now can’t…
Unknown Katherine Mansfield Poems Found in Chicago Library
Nearly 30 unknown poems by Katherine Mansfield have been discovered in Chicago’s Newberry Library, giving fresh insight into the writer’s most painful and difficult period, the evidence for which she had later destroyed. Gerri Kimber,…
Google Doodle Honours Detective Novelist Ngaio Marsh
New Zealand-born crime writer and theatre director Dame Ngaio Marsh who wrote during the “golden age” of detective novels was celebrated on 23 April 2015 with a Google Doodle. Marsh, born in Christchurch, would have…
Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf’s Powerful Partnership
Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf are included in a list of literary “titans” who banded together as penpals whilst they produced the classics. “Before Woolf was lionised she shared an unlikely friendship with a New…
Now You Shall Know Jennifer Compton’s New Collection
Wellington-born poet and playwright Jennifer Compton’s new collection Now You Shall Know “has an early late-career energy about it – and a focus on what is really important,” the Sydney Morning Herald’s Geoff Page…
Writing Struck a Chord for Author Anna Smaill
According to the Independent, New Zealand author Anna Smaill’s debut novel The Chimes is “superb … intriguing, ambitious and strikingly written.” Harper’s Bazaar tips it for “book of the year.” The setting is a dystopian…
Comic Artist Ant Sang Draws on East and West for Inspiration
Award-winning comic artist Ant Sang, who was a guest at this year’s Taipei International Book Exhibition, draws on Western and Eastern influences having spent his childhood and teenage years in New Zealand and Hong…
Paula Morris Makes Lucrative Short Story Comp Longlist
Auckland author Paula Morris has made it onto the 19-strong longlist for the 2015 Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award, the world’s richest prize for a single short story. The award – now…
Anna Smaill’s Debut Novel Communicated Through Music
New Zealand poet Anna Smaill’s debut novel The Chimes, reviewed in the Independent, is “dystopian fiction but not quite as we know it.” “Smaill draws on her training as a classical violinist to create a…
