Still life with speech, the Manawatu home, Wednesday 13 May. (Photo: Supplied)

BooksMay 13, 2020

The morning after at Becky Manawatu’s whare

Guest writer

Still life with speech, the Manawatu home, Wednesday 13 May. (Photo: Supplied)

Last night Becky Manawatu’s Auē won best first novel at the Ockham NZ Book Awards, which she knew about in advance – and the country’s biggest prize for fiction, the $55,000 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize, which she didn’t. So how’s today treating her?

When I woke up this morning (if I can call it waking up lol cause I didn’t sleep just lay there sort of pretending to) the sky was red and I immediately went “uh oh”, and then I was like, “hey would you just cut it out and chill for once in your damn life”.

Right now I am sitting in the lounge and on my coffee table is a collection of empty glasses. Three are wine glasses and four are coffee cups. We drank champagne from them. Champagne the incredibly gorgeous Mary McCallum had brought us to celebrate my win of best first book.

Last night we discovered there is not a single damn champagne flute in this lovely home.

This morning my mum called me and my husband was in bed beside me and he said: “This is all better than that other thing you guys went to that time” and we all cracked up.

Becky Manawatu and her acclaimed debut novel, Auē. (Photo: Tim Manawatu)

What he was referring to was a meeting where winners of a short story competition were to be announced. I had entered the competition a couple of years ago and I learned that the winners would be announced at an AGM meeting in Nelson where Mum lives.

The day of the announcement just happened to be the day Mum and I planned on celebrating Mothers Day.

I decided that I would take her to the AGM to hear the winners be announced lol. Fuck I hate myself, but clearly on this day I felt quite highly of myself. Because I was so sure that I would have been in the mix somewhere (maybe even first place) and it would be like a gift to my mama. So me and Mum went and Mum was awfully confused by the whole thing. There were quartered club sandwiches and orange juice. No booze, which made us frown.

I didn’t tell Mum why we were here to listen to this thing and she just sat there smiling and I sat there smiling and thinking to myself it was going to be the best Mothers Day gift ever because she has always believed I was a writer and supported me so now: loook at me now Mum, winner of a short story taaaadddaaahhhhhhhh

Lol I hate myself.

So anyway they announced third and second and I’m like holy shittttt I might have actual won like this is just the best. Mum is gonna be stoked, I am gonna be stoked and then we will mingle have quartered sandwiches and go somewhere with booze.

So they announced the winner and it was not me and Mum was still smiling but I could see her face had a wtf look all over it. A like wtf are we doing here look, but she smiled and clapped and I did too, and then I think I said “Let’s go Mum”.

We laugh about this day like alllll the time, and I am grateful I was such a dick cause it essentially gave us this gorgeous embarrassing story, like I can still see myself walking down the road like a petulant child wondering how the judges had not appreciated me, if not for my story, for my MUUUMMMM lololololol.

And that was the first thing we talked about this morning, red sky outside, cups and empty bottles over the tables downstairs.

And a beautiful feeling of immense gratitude for so many people, and immense happiness for others, including my mum.

Auē by Becky Manawatu (Mākaro Press, $35) is available from Unity Books. Read the first chapter here, and a remarkable essay by Manawatu here.

SHAYNE CARTER ON STAGE AT THE CARLTON IN CHRISTCHURCH (PHOTO: RACHAEL KING)

BooksMay 12, 2020

Please welcome to the stage: Shayne Carter

Shayne Carter

Guest writer

SHAYNE CARTER ON STAGE AT THE CARLTON IN CHRISTCHURCH (PHOTO: RACHAEL KING)

Dead People I Have Known, a memoir, just won the General Non-Fiction category at the New Zealand Book Awards.

The judges were Hocken librarian and documentary and cultural heritage collections advisor Sharon Dell, bookseller and reviewer Stella Chrysostomou and journalist Guyon Espiner. Their comments, per the press release:

“From the first page, Shayne Carter invites the reader to jump right in and come along for the ride. What follows is an illuminating insight into his childhood, shaped by violence and addiction, of a boy who didn’t fit in and felt saved by music … it is a fascinating look at what it means and feels like to be a creative obsessive – pushing towards perfection despite and because of, addiction, oblivion, and isolation … It is rock-star writing: entertaining, revealing and incredibly heartfelt.”

Carter also took out the E.H. McCormick Prize for best first work of General Non-Fiction. That prize was worth $2500; his wider category win was worth $10,000.

The award ceremony was streamed on YouTube. Winners gave speeches to their screens – no-one got anywhere near a stage. So we thought we’d run a wee bit of the opening section from Dead People I Have Known, where Carter does get his proper dues.

It’s 2005 and we’re at the bNet Awards.

Shayne Carter (Photo: Ebony Lamb Photography)

I’m in the town hall with my head in a pot full of serotonin. About me is the full scent of perfume, freshly pressed jackets, fear, alcohol. I have taken a pill, a very strong pill, and the first effect of it just dropped. My bandmates all wear baffled looks that probably mirror my own.

Half an hour ago we opened the show with two of our favourite tunes, and when our last chord died, it lifted skywards and stayed in the rafters like an old-school victory banner.

Straitjacket Fits are fresh from a tour where we’ve regrouped for a short reunion, and it’s our last stop tonight. We thought we should celebrate, naughtily, a bit illicitly – but back in our seats the wisdom of this may have died.

It’s the bNet New Zealand Music Awards, an evening to honour New Zealand’s edgiest musicians. Half of Auckland is here, turned out in their town hall gear.

There’s a roar. The Prime Minister has come out on the stage. Helen Clark is popular with loser musicians because she’s the Arts Minister, and she has been for six years. She seems to genuinely care about people no one else cares about.

She starts a speech that I’m too far off to hear, her voice low and buried, like a shovel. Slowly, key words wander in from the haze.

“High school punk band … Dunedin… the Doublehappys … Straitjacket Fits … ”

It is now apparent that her speech concerns me. There is no joy in this realisation, just an immense dread, brought on by the potent E.

“And the bNet Lifetime Achievement Award goes to Shayne Carter,” the Prime Minister says, confirming my fears.

The audience claps and starts to stand, and I stand too, like I’ve been sent to the gallows.

I set out on a lonely walk.

As I take the stairs to the podium, I risk a quick peek at the crowd and I can see that it goes back forever. People are peering down from the balcony.

The Prime Minister waits at the rostrum, clutching a statuette, and she wears a dark blue pant suit and red lipstick. She looks different in real life, but maybe that’s just me.

With no real plan, I charge across the stage. Best to get this over.

“Heh heh heh,” the PM says as I press her into my chest.

She takes a short step backwards and hands me my award, smoothing the front of her top.

“Congratulations, Shayne,” she says.

“Thanks, Helen,” I reply, as casually as I can.

I turn to face the mob.

“Thanks,” I say, and my thanks slaps back.

“I wasn’t expecting this, so thanks,” I go, repeating myself.

This is the whole of my speech.

The Prime Minister makes small chit-chat as we walk backstage, but I don’t listen because I’m busy plotting an escape route, any escape route, one that is as fast as possible.

I’m now aware of the two men hovering around us in understated suits, both of them blending with the walls. Wires curl up from their collars and into white plastic pieces in their ears, and when I catch the eye of one of them he gives me a lift of his eyebrow as if to say, “Tied one on, eh matey?”

This is my cue to run. I touch the Prime Minister gently on the elbow. “I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed, Helen. I think I’m going to have to go away and compose myself.”

Without waiting for her response, I turn and stride off down the hall.

Dead People I Have Known by Shayne Carter (Victoria University Press, $40) is available from Unity Books. Read an essay that Rachael King wrote in response to the book, here.