Back then Kade had a death
wish, driving over a hundred
an hour after school, past
young lads, parents, through
the suburbs, cop cars, girl
friends. I drove too, by
the seat of my pants. Now
Kade’s dead, and I alive,
hurtling faster than a hundy
toward the future. Back
then we went bowling.
Kade scored strikes;
I veered toward the gutter.
II
That night we were parking on the back street
in a cone of sleek overshining light.
You had recited string theory,
stopped to nearly get near me, breathing
readied your next leaving. It was then
I saw the other men in you
and knew we were the same I knew
Today, Chris Tse steps down as the editor of The Friday Poem and passes on the baton to Hera Lindsay Bird. Please send poems to info@thespinoff.co.nz.
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.
Min Jin Lee’s novel was published in 2017; season one of the TV series aired in 2022; and season two premiered just last week on Apple TV, which probably explains why the book has shot up the charts again. Good on everyone for buying the book as well as watching the show.
“Part true crime novel, part love letter to fine dining, and part takedown of capitalistic structures in modern-day Japan, Butter is a compelling and intensely readable take on what it means to enjoy life, and all the contributing forces that make that decision complicated.” Read more on the Chicago Review of Books.
Maxwell on Good Reads gave this tome five stars, and this endorsement: “If you are prepared to go on a crazy ride for 700+ pages (oh yeah, if you don’t like chunky books… you get the point), then I can’t recommend The Bee Sting enough.”
6 Poor Things by Alasdair Gray (Bloomsbury UK, $25)
From the author of that extraordinary story, The Vegetarian (which won the Booker Prize in 2016), Greek Lessons is about language and the self. Here’s a snippet from the New York Times review: “This novel is a celebration of the ineffable trust to be found in sharing language, whether between parent and child, teacher and student, or between words spoken aloud and those traced, painstakingly, with a finger on someone else’s waiting palm.”
3 Look Out by Euan Macleod & Craig Potton (Potton & Burton, $80)
An art-photography collaboration. Here’s the blurb: “Look Out is an artistic collaboration that celebrates the sublimity of New Zealand’s Southern Alps by two well-known New Zealand artists. Two friends, painter Euan Macleod and photographer Craig Potton, are both drawn to the high mountains around Aoraki/Mt Cook in the central core of the Southern Alps of New Zealand. On trips together, Euan has painted and Craig has photographed, and although their collaboration is neither literal or conceptual, they are both ignited by each other’s love of these huge mountains. Look Out is their tribute to this faraway, awe-inspiring arena, as well as a reflection on the place of art in understanding the natural world.”
“The book begins with the 1863 crossing of the Mangatāwhiri River by British troops. This act marked the Crown’s declaration of war against the Waikato tribes, igniting a conflict with far-reaching consequences. At its heart, the war was a clash between the Crown’s push for control and Māori insistence on self- governance, a right affirmed in Te Tiriti o Waitangi. The resulting conflict has shaped the nation for over a century, more influential, O’Malley argues, than even New Zealand’s involvement in the two World Wars.
The Invasion of Waikato/Te Riri ki Tainui features short biographies of people and groups who have contributed to our contemporary understanding of the events.”
Tuck me up and put me to bed with Pat Barker. Barker is a queen of the Classical retelling, here’s the blurb for this latest one:
“After ten blood-filled years, the war is over. Troy lies in smoking ruins as the victorious Greeks fill their ships with the spoils of battle.
Alongside the treasures looted are the many Trojan women captured by the Greeks – among them the legendary prophetess Cassandra, and her watchful maid, Ritsa. Enslaved as concubine – war-wife – to King Agamemnon, Cassandra is plagued by visions of his death – and her own – while Ritsa is forced to bear witness to both Cassandra’s frenzies and the horrors to come.
Meanwhile, awaiting the fleet’s return is Queen Clytemnestra, vengeful wife of Agamemnon. Heart-shattered by her husband’s choice to sacrifice their eldest daughter to the gods in exchange for a fair wind to Troy, she has spent this long decade plotting retribution, in a palace haunted by child-ghosts.
As one wife journeys toward the other, united by the vision of Agamemnon’s death, one thing is certain: this long-awaited homecoming will change everyone’s fates forever.”
New Zealand born writer and literary critic Catherine Taylor was just back in Aotearoa for WORD Christchurch and an event with Verb Wellington. Taylor’s memoir is a textured, award-winning, transporting memoir of growing up at the time of the Yorkshire Ripper, miners strikes and the unrest of adolescence itself.