Man in the Running
Wellington author Craig Cliff’s debut short story collection, A Man Melting is in contention for this year’s Commonwealth £5, best first book award. Cliff is up against South African writer Cynthia Jele’s Happiness is…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Hyde’s Bitter Strength
Robin Hyde’s “remarkable tribute, in tough and rugged language, to a Chinese peasant”, the poem “Ku Li” is the Guardian’s “Poem of the Week”. “Ku Li” was begun in China during the second Sino-Japanese…
Migratory musings
Fleur Adcock’s Dragon Talk, her first poetry volume since 1997’s Looking Back — which explored “part of the poet’s wider enquiry into geographical and cultural displacement” — is reviewed by British poet Julian Stannard…
Dutton’s Digital Legacy
Arbiter of culture Denis Dutton was one of the most prominent patrons of the arts of the 21st century, writes Sam Sacks for the Wall Street Journal, reflecting on Dutton’s legacy. While being a…
London’s NZ treasure
Friends Peter Gordon, New Zealand chef, 47, and Briton Tim Lott, acclaimed writer, 54, are interviewed in The Independent on Sunday about how they met, their differences and Gordon’s tartan. “It was around the…
A Renaissance Man
“Denis Dutton, a distinguished philosopher, writer and digital-media guru who founded Arts & Letters Daily, one of the first Web sites to exploit the Internet as a vehicle for meaningful intellectual exchange, has died…
Generations Loved Her
New Zealand-born author Ruth Park, who moved to Sydney in 1942 and who was the author of classic Australian books such as The Harp in the South and The Muddleheaded Wombat, has died in…
Drawn to the horizon
It is the lot of New Zealanders to be peripatetic, says author Lloyd Jones, 55, in an interview with the Independent on Sunday’s James Kidd in Streatham, south London. But at least they have…
Acclaim for debut
Hastings-born author Alison Wong’s debut novel As the Earth Turns Silver, which won the 29 Janet Frame Award for Fiction and the Fiction Award winner at the 21 New Zealand Post Book Awards, has…
Simple literary lines
The New Zealand Book Council is running an advertisement in cinemas throughout the country with a simple message: “Go home, and read a book.” The ad, which rolls after the film credits, was created…
Psychological Primer
Wellington author and English teacher Denis Wright’s debut young adult novel Violence 11 is reviewed in the Los Angeles Times by Susan Carpenter who says the book “is a solid psychological primer that should…
Tears over Billy
“I read a picture book called Billy by Kate De Goldi to my daughter a few nights ago, and one of my tear glands experienced a distinct tweak,” British award-winning novelist David Mitchell admits…
Eerie Compulsion
Lloyd Jones’ latest novel Hand Me Down World is reviewed in the Financial Times. Hand Me Down World, about an illegal immigrant who makes her way from Tunis to Berlin to find her son…
Finding Jean Batten
New Zealand writer Ian Mackersey’s 1991 biography of aviatrix Jean Batten is reviewed by Joseph May on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Readers Blog page. “In unlocked the mystery…
Releasing the writer
“It’s a weird thing to call yourself a ‘writer’ before you’ve written anything that others have read,” Lower Hutt-raised Eleanor Catton, 25, tells the Calgary Herald. “I’m not sure why that stigma exists, exactly,…
On kissing and reading
Miller’s Flat children’s book author Kyle Mewburn was in Wahpeton, North Dakota, at local schools talking to students about reading and writing. Mewburn’s award-winning 28 book Kiss! Kiss! Yuck! Yuck! won the 21 North…
Intimacy in Cincinnati
Geraldine-born playwright Gary Henderson’s Skin Tight opens Cincinnati’s Know Theatre’s season. An hour-long memory play, Skin Tight is part theatrical and melancholy tone poem and part showcase of stage combat. Skin Tight, an intimate…
Perfect introduction
“If you’ve yet to become acquainted with Janet Frame, one of New Zealand’s finest literary exports, then you are in for a treat,” Eden Carter Wood writes in a review of The Daylight and…
Wild Frontier Music
New Zealand-born author Garth Cartwright’s More Miles Than Money: Journeys Through American Music has been released in the United States. Cartwright describes the inspiration for the book in the Wall Street Journal: “Growing up…
Welsh Prize Shortlist
New Zealand author Eleanor Catton, 24, has made the short list for the University of Wales Dylan Thomas Prize. The award, which is open to writers under the age of 3 who have been…
Spunky wonky donkey
Queenstown-born children’s author Craig Smith is currently touring Australia promoting his best-selling book Wonky Donkey. Smith began his tour at Hobart Library where a crowd of 5 children danced and clapped as he read…
Book award winner
Auckland historian Dame Judith Binney’s Encircled Lands has been awarded the New Zealand Post Book of the Year. Encircled Lands explores the history of the Tuhoe people’s journey for autonomy. Dame Binney received $15,…
Inspired in Jodphur
Author of young adult novel The Bone Tiki, New Zealander David Hair, will launch his latest book Pyre of Queens, published by Penguin Books India, in Bangalore. Hair, who lives in New Dehli with…
In between memories
Auckland-born novelist James McNeish, 78, is returning to the country having been in Berlin for the past year working on a memoir. McNeish will travel home to New Zealand via Australia where he is…
Chaucerian find
University of Otago English lecturer Dr Simone Celine Marshall has discovered a previously unidentified edition of the poetry of Geoffrey Chaucer, sometimes referred to as the father of English literature, and best known for…
Discovering Mansfield’s poetry
Katherine Mansfield’s poem The Candle is the Guardian’s ‘Poem of the Week’. “Mansfield is rightly praised for her short stories,” Carol Rumens. “As a poet, however, she is virtually forgotten — ignored even —…
Temple for Story
Prizewinning author Lloyd Jones — whose novel Mister Pip made the Booker shortlist in 27 — has established the Bougainville Library Trust in Arawa, Papua New Guinea, enabling locals to fundraise and build their…
Gong for West trailer
The New Zealand Book Council’s two-minute stop-motion animated trailer for Whakatane-born Maurice Gee’s 1993 novel Going West has won the Best Big Budget/Big Book House Trailer in the inaugural Moby Awards held by…
Illumination in Iowa
Cantabrian author Eleanor Catton talks to American site Eye Weekly about her celebrated debut novel The Rehearsal and how her novel has so far been received. Canadian-born Catton, 25, says the initial reviews in…
Passage to the edge
From the Other End of the World: Memories of post war immigrants to New Zealand from Great Britain is an “enlightening read” bringing “to life an often forgotten period of history”, says the Telegraph’s…
Boarding school magic
New Zealand comic and fiction writer Karen Healey’s debut novel Guardian of the Dead has been released. Guardian of the Dead is a young adult fantasy novel set around a boarding school in Christchurch,…
Rehearsal makes list
Cantabrian author Eleanor Catton’s debut novel The Rehearsal, has been longlisted for this year’s Orange Prize for Fiction, to be announced on June 9. Catton, 24, began writing The Rehearsal, about teenage life, when…
Science for a change
Kumeu neuroscientist and author of The Winner’s Bible Dr Kerry Spackman shares his day, and his work, as part of the Guardian’s Nine to Five series, beginning with a run, which for Spackman is…
Ruthless makes US list
New Zealand romance writer Natalie Anderson’s novel Ruthless Boss, Royal Mistress recently featured in USA Today’s top 150 books sold over the New Year. Her book about a “billionaire businessman who teaches a spoiled…
Ideal weather for tea
Katherine Mansfield’s 1922 short story The Garden Party provides summery inspiration for Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel writer Kristyna Wentz-Graff who includes recipes for making club sandwiches, date scones and pavlova as part of a monthly…
Manhire made happy
Director of Victoria University’s International Institute of Modern Letters and New Zealand’s inaugural poet laureate Bill Manhire has had a poem — My Childhood In Ireland — published in The New Yorker. It is…
Angelic sequel
Wellington author Elizabeth Knox’s latest – a sequel to her 1998 prize-winner The Vintner’s Luck entitled The Angel’s Cut – has been “published to strong praise” writes the Courier Mail’s Kathleen Noonan. The Vintner’s…
Catton shortlisted
Wellington author Eleanor Catton, shortlisted for the 2009 Guardian first book award for her debut novel The Rehearsal, talks to the newspaper about the book’s beginnings, its inspiration and the “hardest bits”. “In…
Talking to the trees
New Zealand business and IT consultant and author Claire Bulman, 41, has released her first book, aimed at children aged seven to ten, The Answer Tree. Maldon-based Bulman is hoping her target audience will…
Amidst the peach trees
“My favourite destination in the world will always be Coromandel in New Zealand,” says British author Fay Weldon in an interview with the Telegraph. “There I can go back to my golden age and…
One for the history books
Renowned New Zealand historian and writer, James Belich, has his latest book Replenishing the Earth: The Settler Revolution and the Rise of the Anglo-world reviewed by The Times’ Bernard Porter, who believes Belich’s fresh…
Such deep silence to hear
Christchurch poet Ursula Bethell’s ‘Rock Crystal’ was a recent Guardian ‘Poem of the Week’. ‘Rock Crystal’, travels beyond the garden and celebrates wider nature. It’s a “holiday poem” but one that takes a metaphysical…
Rewire and succeed
Browns Bay neuroscientist Dr Kerry Spackman, 53, has written a book called The Winner’s Bible which instructs how to rise beyond your natural limits using detailed examples of people Spackman has worked with over…
Solace in the city
Auckland writer Chad Taylor has received a number of reviews commending his latest novel The Church of John Coltrane. A sequel to 1994’s Heaven – made into a film by Miramax in…
Karaoke star is born
New Zealand Herald travel writer Jim Eagles describes a Korean karaoke as “dangerously addictive”. Eagles recently visited Jeju City on a business trip. When his work was done, his Korean host invited him as…
Limelight Shy
Wellington author Eleanor Catton, 23, who is based in Iowa studying at the prestigious Iowa Writers’ Workshop, says in an interview with the Irish Times that she is enjoying travelling the world promoting her…
Stellar young talent
Eleanor Catton, 24, has been praised in the first international reviews for her novel, The Rehearsal, receiving rave write-ups in influential publications The Scotsman, The Times and The Daily Telegraph. Tom…
Accolades for Catton
Wellington author of The Rehearsal (Victoria University Press, NZ and Granta, UK) Eleanor Catton, 23, has won the UK’s Betty Trask Award worth £8,000. Sebastian Faulks presented £60,500 in prize money to twenty-one writers…
Janet’s grace
“To whatever extent the intellectual, emotional, and artistic struggles of Janet Frame’s protagonist mirror those of its author, a wrenching portrait of both emerges, fascinating especially in its exploration of…
Tongue-twisters charm
New Zealand children’s author Margaret Mahy has won a best picture book award for Bubble Trouble at the 2009 Boston Globe–Horn Book Awards for excellence in children’s and young adult literature announced June 2….
Holiday reading
Wellington author and high school teacher Bernard Beckett’s novel Genesis is recommended by American bookseller Roxanne J. Coady on the Women On The Web site, which also includes an excerpt from the first chapter…
Needing Fiction Like Water
Brian Boyd, a distinguished professor of English at the University of Auckland, defends fiction in his new book On the Origin of Stories, which offers an overview and defense of Darwinian literary criticism, though…
Weekend reflections
Grace Cleave, the protagonist of Janet Frame’s 1963 novel Towards Another Summer, is critiqued by columnist and author David Gates in The New York Times’ Sunday Book Review. “Except for David Copperfield, few novels…
War stories recounted
Bluff-born journalist Peter Arnett was the VIP guest speaker at a recent function to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Caravelle Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon). The Pulitzer prize-winning reporter, who filed…
Changing fiction
18 April 2009 – Auckland-based author Witi Ihimaera, 65, is in the process of reworking earlier fiction saying that “as the author grows, so should their stories.” “Writers should be able to transform their…
Writing from abroad
New Zealand-born, Bryan Gould’s latest column for The Guardian Newspaper identifies governments as the only organisations in a position to take the necessary long-term approach needed to stimulate the global economy and counter the…
