New Zealand/Aotearoa Recent Picks

September 2009

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Know Your New Zealand -- Insects and Spiders by John Early.
"New Zealand's insects include some of the world's most remarkable, including the giant weta (one of the world's heaviest insects, dating from dinosaur days) and the world's longest weevil. The most iconic, important and most prominent species and families feature in "Know Your New Zealand Insects and Spiders". Added to the natives are key introduced species, such as the monarch butterfly, and the book also features a selection of noteworthy spiders. This title joins New Holland's hugely successful "Know Your..." series, of which the first two titles - "Birds" and "Trees" - have both reprinted twice less than two years after their release. Written for a family readership and with the novice in mind, the text of "Know Your..." titles is light and easy in tone, with simple language, and is accompanied by full-page, full-color portrait photographs. This book is ideal for anyone interested in identifying the insects and spiders in their neighborhood or in the wild." (Synopsis, www.amazon.co.uk)

Trust : A true story of women & gangs by Pip Desmond.
"In 1977 an idealistic young doctor's daughter, fresh out of university, knocked on the door of a run-down old house in inner-city Wellington. She was greeted by a woman in a Black Power T-shirt with metal in her nose and a spidery tattoo on her left cheek. 'Whaddya want?' the woman growled. So began Pip Desmond's extraordinary time as a member of Aroha Trust, a work cooperative set up in the heady years of feminism, community activism and the first stirrings of the Maori renaissance. For three years this unique, unruly group of girls did physical 'men's work', lived together, and stood side by side against a backdrop of gang violence, police harassment and a society that didn't want to know. When the government changed the rules for relief work, Aroha Trust folded, but the friendships endured. Trust tells the women's stories - much of it in their own words - with the respect and compassion that comes from a shared bond over 30 years. By turns angry, funny, hair-raising, tender, frightening and heartbreaking, Trust above all celebrates the women's struggles to overcome their pasts and build a future for their children. As a unique insight into New Zealand's social history and a way to understand women and gangs, it is without peer." (Synopsis, Random House NZ)

Wine Class : All you need to know about wine in New Zealand by Jo Burzynska.
"Wine Class: All you need to know about NZ wine is an entertaining and informative guide to wine that aims to equip the reader with the confidence to hold their own, discover what they like and understand wine. Brimming with amusing anecdotes and myth debunking, the book is based on Jo Burzynska's popular Adventures in Wine classes - the key factors that affect wine: the influence of region, the key grape varieties, the winemaker plus key wine recommendations in a variety of price brackets, to illustrate what Jo is discussing. It is aimed at beginners, but has a depth that ensures that those with some wine experience will also find it of use and should particularly appeal to a female readership. Jo will be widely recognised through her weekly section in the Herald's Viva and her wine classes held at Seagar's at Oxford." (Synopsis, Random House NZ)

The Lustre Jug by Bernadette Hall.
"In 2007 Bernadette Hall spent six months in Ireland, not far from Blarney, on the Rathcoola Fellowship. The poems in this collection arise from that experience. With light-heartedness and daring, they track between dualities: the North and the South in Ireland; the rain-washed skies of Donoughmore, Co. Cork and the Queensland rainforest. Between national and personal histories. As for poetry, what is it to be, an axe or a peace offering?
" (Synopsis, Victoria University Press)

Your Shout : A toast to drink and drinking in New Zealand by Graham Hutchins.
"An account of New Zealand's constant, sometimes troubled, always fascinating and often humorous encounters with alcohol, from the early days of European contact to the present day. An entertaining account of an often much-maligned subject packed full of anecdotes relating to Kiwis and their encounters with alcohol over the years. Some of NZ's most amusing tales have been either associated directly with grog or have been fired by alcohol. Contentious issues like the Temperance Movement, the threat of Prohibition and the 'Six O'clock Swill' is discussed, along with some of the more amusing aspects of issues that were deadly serious to some. The impact of alcohol on New Zealand literature, folklore and songs and poems are just some of the themes covered. Characters associated with the drinking culture - good and bad - feature prominently. Sly Groggers, hooch makers, main trunk drunks, modern supermarket winos and many others tell their stories, as will beer barons, colourful barmen and women and modern winemakers." (Synopsis, Global Books In Print)

Helen Clark : a political life by Denis Welch.
"Helen Clark led the Labour Party for 15 years, resurrecting it from the rifts of Rogernomics before becoming one of New Zealand's most successful Prime Ministers. Her term as Prime Minister lasted nine years. In 2006 Forbes magazine listed her as the 20th most powerful woman in the world. Clark's time in politics stretches from the anti-war protests of 1968 through the rise of feminism, environmentalism and market forces, to the global financial crisis of 2008 - 40 years of extraordinary political change. Remarkably, no proper political biography of Helen Clark has been written before. Here, for the first time, is the full story of how Clark rose to power and held both the Labour Party and the New Zealand Government together, cementing her place in our country's political history. This is an unauthorised biography. Helen Clark did not co-operate with Denis Welch during the writing of this book." (Synopsis, Global Books In Print)

The Summer King by Joanna Preston.
"The Summer King tells stories, exploring the world we inhabit and our relationships with the other. Myth, catastrophe, family, strangers, sex, sport – all feature in this ‘fine and fierce first collection’ (Gillian Clark). The book contains two sequences: ‘Cowarral’, about Preston’s family farm in the Forbes Valley of NSW, and ‘Venery’, which was inspired by the collective nouns that first appeared in the Book of St Albans. ‘Joanna Preston writes a poised and sensual poetry, with unsettling energies always threatening to break through the surface.’ (Philip Gross)" (Synopsis, Otago University Press)

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