Dame Fiona Kidman discusses This Mortal Boy!

It’s not easy to win a New Zealand Book Award–and it’s even harder to win one on four separate occasions! But that’s exactly what Acorn Foundation Fiction Prize-winner Dame Fiona Kidman has managed to achieve, claiming an award in 1988, 2001, 2006 and now in 2019 with the fantastic This Mortal Boy.

This Mortal Boy is the story of Albert Black, the second-to-last man to be executed in New Zealand. Judges described it as a work that “pulls the reader into mid-century New Zealand–the restlessness of a new urban youth culture, the moral panic that led to the Mazengarb report, the damning assumptions of the legal profession and the unchallenged omissions that eased the pathway to a young man’s death.”

Wellington City Libraries recently had the pleasure of hosting Dame Fiona Kidman as part of our Mystery in the Library event at Karori Library, along with fellow authors Kelly Dennett, Kirsten McDougall, Jennifer Lane and Brannavan Gnanalingam. If you weren’t able to make it to this excellent event, never fear! You can now listen to it in its entirety via the podcast below–including Dame Fiona Kidman describing the process that brought This Mortal Boy to fruition. Enjoy!

Wellingtonian author Pip Adam wins top NZ fiction prize!

Local Wellingtonian author Pip Adam has won the top fiction prize at the Ockham NZ Book Awards with her fantastic novel The New Animals. Published in 2017, this is Pip’s second novel. The award win includes a $50,000 cash prize and has been won previously by Catherine Chidgey, Eleanor Catton, Emily Perkins and other fantastic writers.

In November we interviewed Pip about The New Animals, so make sure to give the blog post a read if you haven’t already. We have the book in our collection in both print and ebook formats, so be sure to reserve it now!

Syndetics book coverThe new animals / Pip Adam.
“Carla, Sharon and Duey have worked in fashion for longer than they care to remember, for them, there’s nothing new under the sun. They’re Generation X: tired, cynical and sick of being used. Tommy, Cal and Kurt are Millenials, they’ve come from nowhere, but with their monied families behind them they’re ready to remake fashion. They represent the new sincere, the anti-irony. Both generations are searching for a way out, an alternative to their messed-up reality. Pip Adam’s new novel walks the streets of Auckland city now, examining the fashion scene, intergenerational tension and modern life with an unflinching eye. From the the wreckage and waste of the 21st century, new animals must emerge.” (adapted from Syndetics)

Pip Adam's The New Animals