Book of the Week: Danyl Mclauchlan reviews a brilliant new biography of Friedrich Nietzsche, who declared, “I am not a man. I am dynamite!” It ended in Turin, on January 3, 1889 when Friedrich Nietzsche shuffled into the Piazza Carlo Alberta. Nietzsche was a sad, solitary figure; he spent his days in Turin’s bookshops, reading … Read more
A round-up of 20 best-sellers this Christmas – featuring the world’s first ever recorded use of emoji reviews. 1 Shit Towns of New Zealand (Allen & Unwin, $24.99) ? 2 The Beautiful Poetry of Donald Trump by Rob Sears (Canongate, $28) ? 3 Normal People by Sally Rooney (Faber, $33) ????? 4 Milkman by Anna … Read more
Steve Braunias reviews the new autobiography by Roger Daltrey, singer with one of the best and worst groups of all times, The Who. The Who! Godawful mostly, although not always. All those unlistenable rock operas and what-not. Tommy. Jesus. But even that fruity melodrama about a deaf, dumb and blind kid who sure did well … Read more
The Monday Extract: Wellington writer John-Paul Powley pulls together Parihaka, imperialism, capitalism, and catered lunches at education conferences in a searching essay on Māori achievement. “This bird [the ruru] with a hundred eyes was venerated in Taranaki, where Te Whiti had chosen this symbol and the stalking Pakeha cat for an action song depicting events that … Read more
New verse by Pt Chevalier writer Jenny Blood. My mother My mother kept eleven glasses of water Beside her bed She would only eat bananas and tinned mandarins Her room stank She said they were trying To kill her I don’t blame them Jenny Blood, 2018 The Spinoff Review of Books is … Read more
Only 32 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s bestselling books at the Unity stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington. AUCKLAND UNITY 1 Simple by Yotam Ottolenghi (Ebury Press, $65) The cookbook of 2018. 2 Past Tense by Lee Child (Bantam, $38) Reacher! 3 Milkman by Anna Burns (Faber & Faber, … Read more
Book of the Week: In which Spinoff Review of Books literary editor Steve Braunias commissions Murray Edmond to review an anthology of New Zealand poetry – first appearing on the Spinoff Review of Books – published by Steve Braunias The cover of The Friday Poem: 100 New Zealand Poems is a photo of someone riding a bike … Read more
Auckland writer Kirsten Warner on the continuing horror of the Holocaust for second generation survivors. A Facebook friend recently made contact to say he’d heard me talking on National Radio about my newly published novel The Sound of Breaking Glass. His wife was, like me, the child of a survivor of the Holocaust. He said he’d … Read more
Author Bruce Ansley follows in the footsteps of Te Puoho, who set off on an epic, 1500-kilometre march with his war party in 1836, intent on destroying an entire people – Ngāi Tahu. I once read a piece by archaeologist Atholl Anderson (Ngāi Tahu), who was then just a budding academic. It was like discovering … Read more
The Monday Extract: A harrowing personal essay by Christchurch poet Jeffrey Paparoa Holman from his new memoir. Even before I took LSD with a poet friend I was becoming unhinged. It was as if I just didn’t care; with a few cans of beer on board to dull the rational sites in the brain, dropping a … Read more
Only 39 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s bestselling books at the Unity stores in Willis St, Wellington, and High St, Auckland. WELLINGTON UNITY 1 Tart & Bitter: Four Decades of Dining Nightmares by David Burton (Potton & Burton, $30) Food. 2 The Friday Poem: 100 New Zealand poems edited by Steve Braunias … Read more
Book of the Week: Jane Westaway reviews Colin Hogg’s portrait of poet Sam Hunt. Personal disclosure first. Sam Hunt and I crossed paths back in the 1970s and early 80s, in his Bottle Creek/Battle Hill/Death’s Corner days. His Minstrel-the-dog and first-son days. And at what he would probably dislike being dubbed his peak-celebrity days. He was … Read more
The Monday Extract: Christchurch coroner Marcus Elliott writes a personal essay about death, grief, and mercy in a new book about dying in New Zealand. Across New Zealand on a Saturday morning, people are playing netball or cricket, mowing the lawn, buying fruit, reading the paper, checking Facebook, living life. I am at my desk at … Read more
New verse by Kirikiriroa writer essa may ranapiri. what the poem isn’t allowed to do the poem isn’t allowed to say abolish the police abolish the police abolish the police return their uniforms to the dirt and their sirens to the odyssey tie a leash to a grenade and send it off teach it how … Read more
Only 46 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s bestselling books at the Unity stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington. AUCKLAND UNITY 1 Milkman by Anna Burns (Faber & Faber, $33) “The Man Booker-winning Milkman richly deserves its prize”: New Zealand Listener. 2 Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami (Harvill Secker, $45) … Read more
A New Zealand reviewer thought that a line in a new novel by acclaimed Irish writer Caoilinn Hughes was about a “head-cold”. She has helpfully pointed out it was a period. “Very cool to be reviewed in New Zealand’s Dominion-Post,” Irish novelist Caoilinn Hughes wrote on the Twitter machine on Tuesday. This was in reference to … Read more
A semi-fictional memoir by Jackson C Payne, son of the late Bill Payne, an ex-con busted for drugs, winner of the 1993 Sargeson Literary Fellowship, author of a classic book about New Zealand gangs, and writer in residence at the Alhambra in Three Lamps. The year after he died they sprinkled his ashes at the house of … Read more
The star of Wellington’s awesome LitCrawl event this weekend is poet Kaveh Akbar, who has a great haircut. Iranian-American poet Kaveh Akbar will perform at Wellington’s annual LitCrawl event this weekend, and so will his haircut. Many say he has the best haircut in world literature. The evidence certainly strongly supports these claims. He is … Read more
New verse by Auckland writer Ian Wedde. from Ode to Auckland When the weather warms up I swim in the murky Waitemata in the upper basin at the bottom of Hamilton Road. Sometimes my friend Jonathan is there, he’s a composer and swims about in a leisurely fashion shifting his rhythm from time … Read more
Only 53 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s bestselling books at the Unity stores in Willis St, Wellington, and High St, Auckland. WELLINGTON UNITY 1 Milkman by Anna Burns (Faber, $33) Winner of the 2018 Man Booker prize for fiction. “A young woman is forced into a relationship with an … Read more
Jesse Mulligan reviews the new cookbook by Jamie Oliver. His calm and measured verdict: It stinks. I made three dishes from this cookbook and they all stank. One of them was the pot-roasted cauliflower, a recipe pushed hard in the Jamie Cooks Italy publicity materials, and one I was deliciously excited about. I love cauliflower, … Read more
An essay by novelist Kirsty Gunn, who claims New Zealand fiction remains besotted with dreary issues of national identity. Quite a while ago now, I wrote a novel about a boy growing up, who loves the sea, loves to surf, and who has a day in the middle of summer when the sea seems to want to … Read more
Only 60 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s bestt-selling books at the Unity stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington. AUCKLAND UNITY 1 Karori Confidential by Leah McFall (Luncheon Sausage Books, $25) Witty, luminous collection by the Sunday magazine columnist. So many zingers! “Karori is like Gloriavale without the … Read more
Charlotte Grimshaw endures a novel full of ‘knowing and coy references to real people’ in New Zealand literature. I have a friend who refers to a certain weekly newspaper column as “the Seventh Form essay.” I recalled this description recently while reading Anne Kennedy’s new novel, The Ice Shelf. “Seventh Form essay” not only implies writing … Read more
New verse by Auckland writer Courtney Sina Meredith. 1 1 x mother 1 x ‘father’ 1 x shooting star Courtney Sina Meredith, 2018 The Spinoff Review of Books is proudly brought to you by Unity Books.
Only 67 shopping days till Xmas! Get in early and peruse the week’s biggest-selling books at the Unity stores in Willis St, Wellington, and High St, Auckland. WELLINGTON UNITY 1 Karori Confidential by Leah McFall (Luncheon Sausage Books, $25) Witty, luminous collection by the Sunday magazine columnist. So many zingers! “Karori is like Gloriavale without the … Read more
Books, books and more books. No captions because our esteemed Braunias, Steve Braunias is away this week, but still, here are the best-selling books from the Unity stores on Willis Street, Wellington and High Street, Auckland. WELLINGTON UNITY 1 Heart of Jesus Valentino: A Mother’s Story by Emma Gilkison (Awa Press, $40) 2 Transcription by Kate Atkinson … Read more
The 2019 Man Booker prize is announced next week. Brannavan Gnanalingam reviews two of the shortlisted novels, Washington Black by Esi Edugyan and The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner. Previously in Man Booker Prize Fight Week: Philip Matthews on Robin Robertson and Richard Powers This year’s Bookers shortlist contained a few surprises – including the … Read more
The 2018 Man Booker prize is announced next week. Philip Matthews reviews two of the shortlisted novels, The Long Take by Robin Robertson and The Overstory by Richard Powers. I can’t promise that everyone would necessarily enjoy Robin Robertson’s The Long Take, but you will remain haunted by it. You may have heard it described as the … Read more