An essay competition for young writers is being held to mark the 70th birthday of New Zealand’s longest-running arts and literary journal. Landfall will celebrate 70 years this year and editor David Eggleton and Otago University Press have launched the Charles…
Category: Literary news
Unusual names prove a winner
Airini Beautrais has taken out the 2016 Landfall Essay Competition, ahead of 50 other entries. Competition judge David Eggleton says her essay, Umlaut , stands out being “written by someone unwilling to be boring, willing to take risks, and enough…
Oratia rebrands and expands
Oratia Media has embraced change in 2016, with a relaunch of its books programme, now named Oratia Books. The name reflects the location to company (just outside Auckland) and a commitment to mostly Kiwi authors by publishing mostly Maori, children’s history,…
April highlights from New Holland
Coming up over the next month from New Holland publishers: FOR THE FOODIES Superfoods for Kids by “superfood expert” Rena Patten, who reckons she has found a way not only to get kids to eat superfoods (think quinoa and kale).…
Poster a trip down memory lane
The average Kiwi fish and chip shop these days is a bit different from those of my long-ago youth: they’re as likely to feature framed prints, arty menus, glossy plants and fancy-schmancy tartare sauce as they are a pile of…
Third book coming in YA cult story
Fleur Beale’s powerful story of life inside a religious cult will have its third installment with the release of Being Magdalene this month. The first book in the young adult series, I am not Esther, was published 16 years ago and…
New name for publisher
Craig Potton Publishing is having a wee name change (to Potton & Burton), in a move the company says reflects the increasingly diverse range of New Zealand books it publishes. The change happens on today and marks the end of a…
The tattooed lady is coming back
The Millennium series was a hugely popular trilogy that introduced the world to Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist, and now they are set to return in a continuation of the late Stieg Larsson’s epic saga. Yes, that’s right: we’re getting…
Run-down truck inspired success story
An old truck on their family farm inspired sisters Margery Fern and Jennifer Somervell to produce a book that has received rave reviews from clients of Invercargill’s Wee Nippers Early Childhood Centre and a mention in the Purple Dragonfly Book…
New book on turning around lives
Boxer Billy Graham has paired up with journalist Phil Gifford to produce a guide for parents of teenage boys. It will be available in bookstores next month. Graham says he would have been born on the wrong side of the tracks…