NEW RELEASES (8.1.26)
Withstand summer with a new book! Click through to our website (or just email us) to secure your copies. We will dispatch your books by overnight courier or have them ready to collect from our door in Church Street, Whakatū.
Into the Weeds by Lydia Davis $31
When asked why she writes, Lydia Davis confesses that the question makes her uncomfortable. Maybe she would rather not know. Instead, Davis considers how she writes her stories, how other writers write, and what insights the how might provide into the why. In this free-ranging exploration, Davis discovers that one reason she writes is for pleasure: the pleasure of encountering something that demands to be treated in language, of handling and manipulating the language into the form it ought to take, and, finally, of seeing a story exist where it didn't exist before. As she observes the processes of some of the authors who interest her the most, she finds that there seem to be as many reasons to write as there are writers: to relive an experience, to share an experience, to articulate something one has not quite comprehended. Reflecting on an eclectic mix of thinkers, including James Baldwin, Kate Briggs, Walter Raleigh, Christina Sharpe, Knut Hamsun, Grace Paley, Josep Pla, John Ashbery, and John Clare, Davis undertakes a clear-eyed, patient inquiry into the manifold reasons we choose to put pen to paper and begin something new. [Hardback]
"Reporting from the slipstream of her reading life, Davis offers less a new way to think than perhaps an old one, pushing back against mechanisation and the collapse of context by reframing reading in the most particular and human terms." —David L. Ulin, The Atlantic
>>On the art of observation.
>>Also by Lydia Davis.
The Earth Is Falling by Carmen Pellegrino (translated from Italian by Shaun Whiteside) $38
A haunting novel based around the existence of an abandoned village outside Naples. The deserted houses that still stand there are peopled with ghosts who live in a perpetual present from which time has effectively been abolished. The village appears to be semi-alive; the landslide which ominously awaits and which will eventually lead to the abandonment of the place has yet to arrive — yet its rumbles are heard. Pellegrino peoples Alento with eccentrics, luminaries, an eternally optimistic town crier. In the closing pages, the narrator Estella summons the remaining ghosts for a final dinner. The overall effect is unsettling, haunting and uncanny, the trapped souls doomed to repeat their circumscribed daily life for ever, cut off from the world but dimly aware of its continued presence outside. The pervading mood of nostalgia and melancholy works in stark contrast with the inevitability of the impending catastrophe of the landslide that threatens to obliterate their world forever. [Paperback]
”What people: so vibrant and vital, if ghosts can be described as such. What a place: precarious yet utterly certain in Carmen Pellegrino’s vivid, poetic rendering. And what a book: melancholy, elegant, original and in its own particular way, totally seductive.” —Wendy Erskine
The Hunger of Women by Marosia Castaldi (translated from Italian by Jamie Richards) $38
Rosa, midway through life, is alone. Her husband passed away long ago, and her cosmopolitan daughter is already out the door, keen to marry and move to the city. At loose ends, Rosa decides to transplant herself to the flat, foggy Lombardy provinces from her native Naples and there finds a way to renew herself--by opening a restaurant, and in the process coming to a new appreciation of the myriad relationships possible between women, from friendship to caregiving to collaboration to emotional and physical love. Made up of Rosa's observations, reflections, and recipes, the novel tracks her mental journey back to reconnect with her own embattled mother's age-old wisdom, forward to her daughter's inconceivable future, and laterally to the world of Rosa's new community of lovers and customers. A tribute not only to the tradition of women's writing on hearth and home but to the legacy of such boundary-breaking feminist writers as Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf, and Helene Cixous. And there’s wonderful food on every page! [Paperback with French flaps]
”A hypnotic theatre of cruelty and tenderness in which the protagonist and narrator Rosa and her friends make vacuum cleaners buzz, exhibit the most lavish forms of desire, desire each other, and desperately, and above all make food, the food which is really the nourishment of the book itself, an obsession formalized here in something like a hundred recipes spread over just under two hundred pages.” —Francesco Durante, Corriere del Mezzogiorno
”The Neapolitan-Milanese Castaldi does not use punctuation, lets thought flow unchained, because life flows like water, and the search for one's identity, always painful, always exhausting, manifests even in our food, the passions in our mouths and hearts.” —Rolling Stone
>>Narrative is only partly recognisable as thoughts.
>>Eating time.
>>Syntax and effect.
Granta 172: Badlands $37
This issue traverses inhospitable landscapes, from troubled childhoods to drone-infested Ukraine. Featuring reportage from William T. Vollman and memoir from Annie Ernaux. Fiction by Brittany Newell, Leopold O’Shea, Natasha Stagg, Stephanie Wambugu and Diane Williams. Poetry by Nasim Luczaj, Paul Muldoon, Sharon Olds and Frederick Seidel. Plus, photography by Sana Badri, Joel Meyerowitz (introduced by George Prochnik) and Cian Oba-Smith (introduced by Julián Herbert). [Paperback]
From Scenes Like These by Gordon M. Williams $28
It's the west of Scotland in the 1950s. New houses are going up. Factories are opening. But Dunky Logan, a 15-year-old brought up in a tenement flat in working-class Kilcaddie, is ditching school to be a labourer on a local farm. Dead set on becoming a hard case, he wants to work shoulder to shoulder with so-called real men. Irish Catholic Mary O'Donnell arrives at the farmhouse as the new maid. She is pregnant — no boyfriend in sight. But she's smart, and she has a plan to get herself up in the world. As Dunky is swallowed up by a vicious cycle of violence, betrayal, and booze, Mary becomes entangled in a savage family feud. Short-listed for the 1969 (first!) Booker Prize. [Paperback]
”An elegy to ordinary lives. A forgotten classic entirely deserving of a place in the canon of great social realism novels of the twentieth century. A raw, unsparing tale of coming of age, of masculinity in crisis, of farm workers holding on as post-war Britain encroaches upon them. A masterpiece of time and place that looks you square in the eye and demands to be read.” —Douglas Stuart
”A devastating study of 1950s Scottish adolescence by one of the most consummate stylists of the whole post-war era. From Scenes Like These is a genuine lost classic just waiting to be rediscovered by a new generation of readers.” —DJ Taylor
Fair Play by Louise Hegarty $38
Abigail and her brother Benjamin have always been close. To celebrate his birthday, Abigail hires a grand old house and gathers their friends together for a murder mystery party. As the night goes on, they drink too much and play games. Relationships are forged, consolidated or frayed. Someone kisses someone they shouldn't, someone else's heart is broken. In the morning, everyone wakes up — except Benjamin. Suddenly everything is not quite what it seems. An eminent detective arrives determined to find Benjamin's killer. The house now has a butler, a gardener and a housekeeper. This is a locked-room mystery, and everyone is a suspect. As Abigail attempts to fathom her brother's unexpected death in a world that has been turned upside down, she begins to wonder whether perhaps the true mystery might have been his life. [Paperback]
”Louise Hegarty's genre-splicing debut is a treat — clever, confident, and always surprising, a mystery story that ingeniously escapes the locked room of the genre to take on the biggest questions of life and death.” —Paul Murray
”Dazzling, formally subversive, brimming with compassion, Fair Play explodes the conventions of a mystery in order to confront us with the genuinely mysterious. An emotional ambush of a novel, this book will delight readers — then it will haunt them.” —Colin Walsh
Vulture by Phoebe Greenwood $38
Catch-22 on speed and set in the Middle East, Vulture is a fast-paced satire of the war news industry and its moral blind spots, and a tragi-comic coming-of-age novel. An ambitious young journalist, Sara is sent to cover a war from the Beach Hotel in Gaza. The four-star hotel is a global media hub, promising safety and generator-powered internet, with hotel staff catering tirelessly to the needs of the world's media, even as their own homes and families are under threat. Sara is determined to launch her career as a star correspondent. So, when her fixer Nasser refuses to set up the dangerous story she thinks will win her a front page, she turns instead to Fadi, the youngest member of a powerful militant family. Driven by the demons of her entitled yet damaging childhood, Sara will stop at nothing to prove herself in this war, even if it means bringing disaster upon those around her. Greenwood's debut novel brings readers deep into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and with audacity and humour depicts the media's complicity in this ongoing tragedy. [Paperback]
"Brave, funny and beautifully written." * Martin McDonagh, writer and director *
"In a debut redolent of Graham Greene, Phoebe Greenwood brings to life — in all their cynicism and all their humanity — the bullying, bragging, brilliant characters we rely on to bring us the news." —Benjamin Moser
>>Why did it take the world so long to be outraged?
Slow Down or Die: The economics of degrowth by Timothée Parrique $40
One of the most ingrained beliefs of our age is that perpetual economic growth is the solution to most, if not all, of society's problems. Parrique challenges this myth, demonstrating how producing more won't solve climate change, poverty, or inequality. In fact, our obsession with growth is accelerating social and ecological collapse. Parrique proposes a different vision — a ‘post-growth’ economy, where we look beyond the vagaries of GDP and measure our economies through how well we provide for each other. Instead of infinitely accumulating wealth, our goal must be a just, equitable, and sustainable society. [Paperback]
”A clear vision for a profoundly different economy.” —Irish Times
>>How to blow up an economy.
>>Slow is the new cool.
A Counter of Moons: Living with the unimaginable by Iona Winter $30
In 2020, Iona Winter’s son Reuben died by suicide. Looking for solace and understanding from others’ stories, she found there were few available. A Counter of Moons candidly shares Iona’s experiences, and her reflections challenge widespread ideas about how to deal with grief. At times raw and confronting, at others introspective and tender, this book ultimately speaks about the coexistence of love and pain. It aims to start conversations about suicide bereavement in Aotearoa, to give words to an often wordless experience. [Paperback]
Detective Beans: Adventures in Cat Town by Li Chen $22
Detective Beans is back to solve all the mysteries that you need solved, and even the ones you don't need solved. He's that good. In between playing Scrabble, having sleepovers and trips to the beach, there's always time for crime solving. Whether it's who ate Mum's donuts, who has lost their handbag in the park, which pigeon stole King Chip, or even a burgled diamond ring, Beans is ready for anything. He's so ready that he's even starting a detective school — if he can find any students… A very enjoyable Aotearoa graphic novel for children. [Paperback]
>>Look inside!
>>The Case of the Missing Hat.
The Experiment by Rebecca Stead $22
Nathan never understood what was 'fun' about secrets, probably because he's always had to keep a very big one, even from his best friend, Victor. Although he appears to be a typical intermediate-school kid, Nathan learned at an early age that his family is from another planet, and he's part of an experiment to work out how to behave like a human and blend in. But the experiment suddenly seems to be going wrong. Some of the other experimenters, including Nathan's first crush, Izzy, are disappearing without a word. After his family is called back to the mothership, Nathan begins to question everything he's been taught to believe about who he is and why he's on Earth. Can he, Victor and Izzy uncover the truth? The Experiment is a fast-paced adventure — with aliens — that asks universal questions about how we figure out who we want to be, whether it's ever too late to change, and the importance of friendship. [Paperback]