In her very first festival appearance following the publication of Kataraina, Becky Manawatu discusses the highly anticipated sequel to her bestselling debut novel, Auē, alongside friend and fellow kaituhi Māori Talia Marshall, whose essay collection, Whaea Blue, is one of this year’s most anticipated non-fiction pukapuka. Chaired by Nuki Tākao.
In this Pukapuka Talks session, we celebrate Patricia Grace’s eighth short story collection, the astonishing Bird Child and Other Stories, as well as her remarkable writing life over almost 50 years. Patricia will discuss her latest book, her approach to writing and how she has collaborated with her talented whānau, in conversation with Donna McLeod.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
Lauren Keenan and Cristina Sanders are two of Aotearoa New Zealand’s preeminent historical fiction writers. Journey back in time with them to hear about their new books, The Space Between and Ōkiwi Brown - an opportunity to experience life through the eyes of those who history books have, to date, largely neglected. Chaired by Sylvan Thomson.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
In a world first, on the day the global sales embargo ends, hear Jacqueline Bublitz talk about her new novel, Leave the Girls Behind, the dazzling follow-up to her 2022 Ngaio Marsh Award–winning debut novel, Before You Knew My Name. Chaired by Susie Ferguson.
From an author who “pushes the boundaries of crime fiction in all the right ways” (Alex Finlay, author of The Night Shift), Leave the Girls Behind is another spine-chilling thriller that will linger long after you finish the last page.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
Dave Hansford and Debs Martin discuss the role storytelling must play in triumphing over commercial and political agendas. In his latest book Kahurangi, Hansford documents one of the most significant natural regions in Aotearoa: Kahurangi National Park, along with the adjoining areas of Whanganui Inlet, Wharariki and Onetahua/Farewell Spit. Together, they are home to the greatest variety of plants and animals in the country, with many not found elsewhere on the planet. Hansford, one of our country’s foremost science and natural history writers, is eloquent and uncompromising in his arguments for why and how we must urgently rescue these precious wild lands. Kahurangi is nature writing at its absolute finest.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
RNZ presenter Susie Ferguson recounts her years as a war correspondent while battling endometriosis and discusses her breathtaking memoir on tenacity and self-belief, which shines a light on a health system that isn’t made for us and proves the importance of being loud with our truths. Chaired by Naomi Arnold.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
Rachael King and Lee Murray both evoke ancient mythological creatures from distant shores in their latest novels: The Grimmelings and Fox Spirit on a Distant Shore. Scottish folklore inspired Scottish folklore inspired King to write about a vengeful black horse-like creature called a kelpie, while Murray has made the ancient Chinese fox spirit húli jīng her narrator. Chaired by Claire Mabey, who is The Spinoff Books editor and author of The Raven's Eye Runaways.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
Multi-generational migrant stories are finding compelling new ways of being told in the capable, creative hands of Jade Kake, author of Checkerboard Hill, and Saraid de Silva, author of Amma. Both explore belonging and the legacy of intergenerational trauma while mastering a unique way of sharing the diasporic experience. Chaired by Elizabeth Heritage.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's 2024 Contestable Fund Grant.
In Aotearoa the number of people who will never have children is growing. In Otherhood: Childless, Childfree and Child Adjacent, co-editors Alie Benge, Kathryn van Beek and Lil O’Brien have assembled the perspectives of 36 writers for whom having children isn’t part of their life-path: from those who’ve chosen to remain child free, those who didn’t get to choose, and those whose version of family life looks a whole lot different to what they first envisioned. In this Pukapuka Talks session, Kathryn van Beek is joined by contributors Iona Winter, Henrietta Bollinger and Lily Duval for a more inclusive conversation about what makes a fulfilling life.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's Contestable Fund Grant 2024.
From accessible housing design to the tiny house movement, and everything in between, what happens when people step outside the box in housing design and development? Join architect and housing advocate Jade Kake, disability rights advocate, essayist and poet Henrietta Bollinger and local visionary Miriana Stephens, who is leading Te Āwhina Marae’s redevelopment project, in conversation with architect Min Hall.
This podcast was produced with the support of Copyright Licensing New Zealand's Contestable Fund Grant 2024.
Join singer, taonga pūoro musician and writer Ariana Tikao, photographer Matt Calman and local writer Nuki Takao for a kōrero about the stunning illustrated nonfiction book, Mokorua: Ngā kōrero mō tōku moko kauae – My story of moko kauae, which is a revealing and emotional account of how Ariana received her moko kauae. Held in conjunction with Kanohi Kitea, an exhibition that presents tā moko amongst tangata whenua.
Ariana Tikao grew up in suburban Christchurch in the 1970s and ’80s surrounded by te ao Pākehā. This book tells the story of Ariana exploring her whakapapa, her whānau history and her language. This is one woman’s story, but it is interwoven with the revival of language, tikanga and identity among Kāi Tahu whānau over the past 30 years.
Ariana’s journey culminates in her decision to take on Mokorua – her moko kauae – from tā moko artist Christine Harvey. After an emotionally charged ceremony that brought together whānau, young and old, for songs and tautoko, hugs and tears, Ariana writes: ‘Our whānau had reached another milestone in the decolonisation process – or, rather, in our journey of reindigenising ourselves, becoming who we always were.’
Through Ariana’s words, te reo Māori text by her hoa tāne Ross Calman, and an intimate, moving photo essay by Matt Calman, Mokorua reveals the journey of one woman reclaiming her Māori identity. Ariana will be joined by Matt and local writer Nuki Takao to kōrero about her experiences and the creation of the pukapuka.
Commune: Chasing a Utopian Dream in Aotearoa captures the spirit of the counter-culture movement in the Motueka Valley from the perspective of Olive Jones, one of its founding members.
Olive Jones was a teenager when she joined a group of hippies, idealists and subsistence farmers, determined to reject their parents’ way of life. Influenced by the counter-culture movement sweeping New Zealand in the 1970s, they purchased an idyllic farm close to Nelson. Their experiments in communal living were an attempt to achieve social, sexual and physical liberation from the rigid world in which they grew up. Ultimately, without rules and membership, their unstructured community failed to thrive and fulfil its early vision.
Jones‘s highly personal and candid memoir recalls the dreams, madness, humour and hard graft of living an alternative lifestyle in the Motueka Valley. Chaired by Kerry Sunderland.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of Witi Ihimaera’s Tangi, the first novel written by a Māori author to be published in New Zealand. Six fellow Māori writers - Emma Espiner (MC), Vaughan Rapatahana, Ruby Solly, Donna McLeod, Arihia Latham and Airana Ngarewa - join Witi at this special gala event to celebrate Aotearoa storytelling. The kōrero begins, after the mihi whakatau and a short clip from Whale Rider (the stage play) at 07:55.
To commemorate Witi’s contribution to Aotearoa literature, Penguin Books NZ have published two new anthologies of Māori writing this year: Te Awa o Kupu and Ngā Kupu Wero.
These two passionate and vibrant anthologies, which have been edited by Witi, Vaughan Rapatahana and Kiri Piahana-Wong, feature more than 80 contemporary Māori writers. Together they reveal that the irrepressible river of words flowing from Māori writers today shows us who and what we are.
It all started 50 years ago when Witi’s debut novel, Tangi, was published. A landmark literary event, it went on to win the James Wattie Book of the Year Award. Witi was just 29 years old at the time.
Revisiting the text for this special anniversary edition, Witi has added richer details and developed the nascent themes that have continued to preoccupy him over a lifetime of writing. As part of the 50-year celebration, Penguin Books NZ has also re-released Witi‘s first book, the short story collection, Pounamu, Pounamu (first published in 1972).
At this special event, Emma Espiner will facilitate a kōrero with Witi and Vaughan about Māori storytelling’s upsurge in New Zealand literature, interspersed with performances by some of the contributors to the two anthologies: Emma herself, Arihia Latham, Donna McLeod, Airana Ngarewa and Ruby Solly.
Award-winning doctor and writer, Dr Emma Espiner, discusses her stunning debut memoir, There’s a cure for this, with Arihia Latham. Together they kōrero about hurt and healing, love and loss, life and death, motherhood and medicine.
From the quietly perceived inequities of her early life to hard-won revelations as a Māori medical student and junior doctor during the Covid-19 pandemic, Emma‘s story is a candid and moving examination of what it means to be human when it seems like nothing less than superhuman will do. Her story is an exploration of hurt and healing, love and loss, life and death, motherhood and medicine. With Latham, who is a rongoa Māori practitioner, they will also explore how incorporating te ao Māori in our healthcare system could benefit us all.
Emma Ling Sidnam, Airana Ngarewa and Colleen Maria Lenihan discuss their stunning debut books, and reveal what gave them the courage to write, with Paula Morris.
Join acclaimed author and creative writing teacher Paula Morris in a discussion with the three debut authors she hand-picked as new authors she predicts will change the literary landscape in Aotearoa forever. They are writers you can’t afford not to read.
Emma Ling Sidnam’s debut novel, Backwaters, is a tender, nuanced novel about the bittersweet search for belonging. Airana Ngarewa’s debut novel The Bone Tree is a stunning coming of age story about two brothers who must learn to survive on their own in the world. With gritty lyricism, The Bone Tree gives voice to characters on the margins of society – and it considers the question of how we can best protect the ones we love. Kōhine, the short story collection by Colleen Maria Lenihan (Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi), juxtaposes Tokyo’s salarymen, sex workers and schoolgirls with rongoā healers, lone men and rural matriarchs of Aotearoa New Zealand.
Rebecca Priestley discusses her new book, End Times, which is part memoir/part road trip exploring climate science, climate denial and belief systems, with Jude Watson.
What do the Christian right, natural health practitioners and farmers have in common? Rebecca Priestley examines this question and more in End Times, a work of creative nonfiction that interweaves two stories. In one, Priestley explores two of her teenage years, when in the late 1980s she and her best friend Maz became born-again Christians. Evangelists were preaching about the end times, convinced that the Pope was the Antichrist and the EFT-POS cards were the beginning of the 666 system.
This often dramatic experience is countered with a contemporary journey – a 2021 road trip with the same friend – to the West Coast, a part of New Zealand where the then mayor was a climate change denier, locals distrusted the Covid-19 vaccine, there were looming threats of both sea level rise and a statistically overdue massive earthquake, and conspiracy theories abounded. In the book, Priestley interrogates fake news, disinformation, conspiracy theories, science and why people believe what they believe.
Monty Soutar ONZM shares the story behind his bestselling and critically acclaimed debut novel, Kāwai: For Such a Time as This. The kōrero is facilitated by Airana Ngarewa.
Kāwai: For Such a Time As This has been in the NZ bestseller list since its launch in Sept 2022 and was shortlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the 2023 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.
In this epic historical adventure by Monty Soutar, ONZM (Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Awa, Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki, Ngāti Kahungunu) tells the story of pre-colonial Aotearoa New Zealand like it’s never been told before, drawing on both his extensive academic research as well as a series of extraordinary tohu (signs).
Tracing the author’s own ancestral line, Kāwai: For Such a Time As This reveals a picture of an indigenous Aotearoa in the mid-18th century, through to the first encounters between Māori and Europeans. It describes a culture that is highly sophisticated with an immense knowledge of science, medicine, and religion; proud tribes who live harmoniously within the natural world; a highly capable and adaptable people to whom family and legacy are paramount. However, it is also a culture illuminated by a brutal undercurrent of inter-generational vengeance, witchcraft, and cannibalism.
Kāwai: For Such a Time As This is the first in a series of three books the respected historian hopes will reveal the role of colonisation in shaping Aotearoa New Zealand, balanced with an honest appraisal of the country in pre-colonial times.
Caroline Barron's Golden Days and Anne Tiernan's The Last Days of Joy are both gripping novels that explore how the past can haunt us in the present. Paula Morris facilitates this gripping conversation.
We meet Barron‘s protagonist Becky when she is mourning the end of her picture-perfect marriage. As she unravels, Becky also remembers one terrifying night in 1995 that changed her life forever. When Zoe, her best friend at the time, reappears in her life, she is forced to reconsider her interpretation of what happened.
In her bestselling debut novel, Tiernan‘s story is told by three adult siblings, including Sinead, a bestselling author struggling to write her second book. Like her brother Conor and her sister Frances, Sinead carries the scars of their mother’s alcoholism, which we learn is her response to a tragedy in their early childhood, a time they all remember differently.
Both stories are book club-worthy page turners that raise questions about alcohol use, family, friendship and the human capacity for self-deception. When secrets surface, each character does what they can to survive but inevitably they must each reckon with the truth.
Join psychologist Alia Bojilova and keen tramper and writer Victoria Bruce as they explore resilience and their respective understanding of the mind-body connection. Chaired by Liz Price.
When she was kidnapped in Syria during a stint with the NZ Army, Alia Bojilova managed to talk her way out of captivity and has gone on to become a top performance coach. She has turned what she has learnt into a new book, The Resilience Toolkit.
Victoria Bruce walked the 3,000 kilometre Te Araroa with her daughter Emilie to test the limits of her own resilience and reckon with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. In Adventures with Emilie, she reveals how spending an extended period connecting with nature not only helped her connect with herself and her daughter, but it also released long-repressed memories, bringing them into the light to be acknowledged, grieved, processed, and healed.
They discuss two very different approaches to achieving wellbeing, united by their respective understanding of the mind-body connection.
Lotta Dann (Mrs D), the author of three bestselling books about alcohol, joins RNZ broadcaster Guyon Espiner to discuss - with Matty Anderson - why the odds are stacked against those who want to get off booze. Buckle up for a sobering look into how the way you drink is shaped not only by your individual choice, but also by government, media and big business.
In The Drinking Game, investigative journalist Guyon Espiner provides an incisive analysis of how our drinking culture is influenced by the government, media and big business.
Four years ago, Espiner gave up drinking alcohol. He had been a heavy yet controlled drinker since his teens – abstaining three nights a week but making up for it the other four. One morning he woke up after a big night and decided he’d had enough and he quit – no AA, no support groups. Not drinking has given Guyon a new perspective on our relationship with alcohol in Aotearoa, and a lot of it is disturbing.
The Drinking Game investigates the alcohol industry: the power, politics and lobbying behind our most harmful drug. Weaving together personal experience, hard research and interviews, it examines why Aotearoa New Zealand has such a heavy drinking culture, the harm it causes and how our attitudes to alcohol are changing.
Likewise, Lotta Dann‘s 2020 book, The Wine O’Clock Myth, takes a critical look at the easy availability and widespread promotion of alcohol – including on social media – but she focuses, in particular, on how the alcohol industry specifically targets women. Dann is also the author of two personal accounts of what it’s like to go from being a boozy housewife downing a bottle of wine a day to being completely alcohol-free: Mrs D is Going Without and Mrs D is Going Within. In her latest book, she calls for regulatory changes to prevent the alcohol industry from promoting a damaging ‘Wine Mum’ culture.