Every Dog Has Its Day: A Thousand things You Didn’t Know About Man’s Best Friend, by Max Cryer (Exisle Publishing, RRP $30): After penning books on everything from proverbs to music, Max Cryer has now turned his attention to man’s…
Category: NZ books
Kiwi history makes this a page-turner
Fitz: The Colonial Adventures of James Edward Fitzgerald, by Jennifer Roberts (Otago University Press, RRP $40): The subject of this biography is an important figure in the settlement of Canterbury. He was the province’s first superintendent, a politician, a watercolourist and founder…
■ REVIEW
Landscape Paintings of New Zealand
Seven years after first being published, this expanded and revised edition was back in the bookstores just in time for an appearance under last year’s Christmas tree, and this year it’s still a fine option for anyone on your pressie…
Kiwi angle helps lift tone of novel
Unearthed, by Steve Hodgkinson (Orb Publishing, RRP $33): This is a New Zealand environmental thriller with a message or two. Set in the Waikato, Sam Miro is a young, highly regarded researcher working on environment monitoring. When some of his study farms…
Taste of what makes New Zealand great
Our New Zealand, by Sarah Ell and Nicola Legat (Random House NZ, RRP $50): It’s getting to that time of the year when you are perhaps thinking about Christmas gifts for family and friends overseas, and you’d be hard pressed…
Soldiers’ snaps bring war home
Anyone attending Anzac Day services will be left in no doubt that there is growing interest among younger Kiwis in our military history. Each year, it seems there are more and more families at these services and there is a…
Fascinating trip down memory lane of advertising
Sell, by Hazel Phillips (Penguin, RRP $45): Advertising plays a big role in our memories of growing up and this book looks at how New Zealand’s advertising industry has grown up with us. Subtitled “tall tales from the legends of…
Short, but perfectly formed
A Short History of New Zealand, by Gordon McLauchlan (Bateman, RRP $30): Being a relatively young nation, our history is naturally a tad shorter that that of some of the other countries on this planet but that doesn’t mean there…
A little something to cure what ails you
Pills & Potions At the Cotter Medical History Trust, by Claire Le Couteur (Otago University Press, RRP $25): This little book offers a fascinating trip down the memory lane of pills, potions and, in some cases I am sure, snake-oil…
Trio of books look at NZ’s architectural heritage
New Zealand’s Lost Heritage, by Richard Wolfe (Hew Holland Publishers, RRP $50): The preservation of our historic buildings is often a topic of debate in this country, with passionate arguments for (it’s our history) and against (usually the cost). We…