Holly Walker

Guest writer

Holly Walker lives in Wellington and is deputy director of The Helen Clark Foundation. She served in parliament as a Green MP, and her first book, The Whole Intimate Mess, was published by Bridget Williams in 2017. Holly was born in Lower Hutt in 1982.

The London borough of Waltham Forest shows the principles of low-traffic design in action (Photo: CK Travels / Shutterstock.com)

Driving less saves lives, but low-traffic areas aren’t on NZ’s road safety agenda

Lockdown gave us a taste of a low-traffic future, but it shouldn't take a pandemic to reduce cars on our roads.

By Holly Walker | 11th November, 2020

Photo: Getty Images

How our leaders can minimise the negative effects of loneliness after Covid-19

Politicians can't make us feel less lonely, but they can adopt policies that create conditions for meaningful social interaction to flourish.

By Holly Walker | 1st May, 2020

Getty Images

The perils of loneliness in the time of Covid-19

Physical isolation may be the way to eliminate Covid-19, but it could come at a high cost to mental health.

By Holly Walker | 14th April, 2020

Margaret Atwood attends Noir In Festival on December 6, 2017 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Rosdiana Ciaravolo/Getty Images)

An awkward, expensive, perplexing night with Margaret Atwood and Kim Hill

Other than the fact that it's a tidy earner, why is famed Handmaid's Tale author Margaret Atwood doing this tour at all, wonders Holly Walker.

By Holly Walker | 12th February, 2020

Image: Getty Images.

The memoir that asks: Can I be a mother, and still be myself?

“The obliteration of self. The prioritising of others. The yearning for escape”: Holly Walker on a motherhood memoir that rings in the bones.

By Holly Walker | 9th April, 2019

(Portrait by Roberto Ricciuti/Getty Images)

The fifth best book of 2018: My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh

All week this week we name and review the five very best books of 2018. Today: Holly Walker reviews the fifth best book, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, a novel about the desperate joys of sleep.

By Holly Walker | 17th December, 2018

Hollie McNish

‘I was so angry that it was so difficult!’ Poet Hollie McNish talks motherhood with Holly Walker

Poet and spoken word artist Hollie McNish is coming to New Zealand to speak at Word Christchurch in September. Holly Walker caught up with McNish to discuss motherhood and writing.

By Holly Walker | 14th August, 2018

New Labour MPs Kiri Allan, left, and Willow-Jean Prime with their babies in Parliament this week. Screengrabs: TVNZ

I left parliament because I couldn’t be an MP and a mother. This week has given me hope

Holly Walker, former Green MP and author of a memoir of being a mother in parliament, says this week's images of babies in the debating chamber indicate a new attitude to working mothers in politics. But there's still a long way to go.

By Holly Walker | 9th November, 2017

Book of the Week: Holly Walker reviews a compelling gothic Kiwi novel

Book of the Week: Holly Walker reviews a compelling gothic Kiwi novel

Holly Walker reviews a moody, gothic novel set in the brooding countryside of the Wairarapa.

By Holly Walker | 7th September, 2017

Oh great, a novel that risks glamourising youth suicide

Oh great, a novel that risks glamourising youth suicide

What the hell is Sarah Quigley playing at in her novel about three mentally ill young people on the brink of suicide, wonders Holly Walker.

By Holly Walker | 11th July, 2017