People enjoying the colorful Holi festival in Barcelona a indian tradition to welcome the spring covering himself of gulal powder, moment when all the crowd throwing the colorful powder to the air with arms raised. Catalonia, Europe.
People enjoying the colorful Holi festival in Barcelona a indian tradition to welcome the spring covering himself of gulal powder, moment when all the crowd throwing the colorful powder to the air with arms raised. Catalonia, Europe.

BooksOctober 21, 2016

The weekly Unity Books best-seller chart: October 21

People enjoying the colorful Holi festival in Barcelona a indian tradition to welcome the spring covering himself of gulal powder, moment when all the crowd throwing the colorful powder to the air with arms raised. Catalonia, Europe.
People enjoying the colorful Holi festival in Barcelona a indian tradition to welcome the spring covering himself of gulal powder, moment when all the crowd throwing the colorful powder to the air with arms raised. Catalonia, Europe.

The weekly best-seller chart at Unity stores in Auckland and Wellington, for the week just ended: October 21

AUCKLAND STORE

1 Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (Harvill Secker, $40) by Yuval Noah Harari

“The epic, widely celebrated Sapiens gets the sequel it demanded – a breathless, compulsive inquiry into humanity’s apocalyptic, tech-driven future”: The Guardian.

2 The Great War for New Zealand: Waikato 1800-2000 (Bridget Williams Books) by Vincent O’Malley

“Tainui has never forgotten things like the atrocities that were committed against their women and children at Rangiaowhia, for example… Those memories have been carried on down through the generations. They’ve even been reflected in the names people are given. For example, a common name for many women in Tainui was Mamae, or pain, across many generations to carry the remembrance of those events”: The author, interviewed by Aaron Smale for Radio New Zealand.

3 The Big Smoke: New Zealand Cities, 1840-1920 (Bridget WIlliams Books, $60) by Ben Schrader

New Zealand cities, 1840-1920.

4 Known and Strange Things (Faber & Faber, $33) by Teju Cole

Essays.

5 Hot Milk (Hamish Hamilton, $37) by Deborah Levy

Shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize! Female rage and sexuality, set in a Spanish fishing village.

6 Eileen (Vintage, $26) by Ottessa Moshfegh

Shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize! Psychological thriller by a young US writer about a woman who works in a boys’ prison.

7 His Bloody Project (Text, $34) by Graeme Macrae Burnet

Shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize! Weird, gory novel about a Scotsman accused of triple-murder.

8 The Sellout (Oneworld, $28) by Paul Beatty

Shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize! Satirical novel about a man who reinstates slavery in the US.

9 Commonwealth (Bloomsbury, $33) by Anne Patchett

Not shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize. Two families are torn apart by a tragedy.

10 Do Not Say We Have Nothing (Granta, $33) by Madeleine Thien

Shortlisted for next week’s Man Booker Prize! Canadian novel set in Mao’s China.

WELLINGTON STORE

1 Murdoch: The Political Cartoons of Sharon Murdoch (Potton Burton, $40) by Sharon Murdoch

Over 150 full-page cartoons by the best – the most astute, the most artful – political cartoonist in New Zealand.

2 The Big Smoke: NZ Cities 1840–1920 (Bridget Williams Books, $60) by Ben Schrader

3 Constitution for Aotearoa NZ (Victoria University Press, $25) by Geoffrey Palmer & Andrew Butler

From the mind of the former MP who was responsible for the Imperial Laws Application Act .

4 Maui & Other Legends: 8 Classic Tales of Aotearoa (PenguinRandom, $40) by Peter Gossage

“Peter was a true household name in New Zealand, because almost every family read and loved his picture books.”

5 Hera Lindsay Bird (Victoria University Press, $25) by Hera Lindsay Bird

“Throw me in a haunted wheelbarrow and set me on fire”.

6 Day with Dogs (Gecko, $30) by Dorothee de Monfreid

For children.

7 Pigeon Tunnel: Stories from My Life (Viking, $38) by John Le Carre

“A series of vignettes written with good humour”: Ken Strongman, Sunday Star-Times.

8 Great War for NZ: Waikato 1800-2000 (Bridget Williams Books, $80) by Vincent O’Malley

9 Protecting Paradise: 1080 & The Fight to Save NZ’s Native Wildlife (Potton Burton, $35) by Dave Hansford

The fight to save New Zealand’s native wildlife.

10 Mansfield & Me: A Graphic Memoir (Victoria University Press, $35) by Sarah Laing

And so the best-selling book and the tenth-best-selling book at Wellington’s Unity store are both told in drawings. Discuss.

Keep going!