Ann MacRae : The Kingsland Kid

Reviewed by BERNARD BROWN

Ann MacRae gives us 13 weeks in the life of Damien Teariki in mid-80s Kingsland. Damien is half-Pakeha, his younger brother full-blooded — blond, blue-eyed with "Hollywood lashes", and the two wage a love-hate relationship.

Their mother, Debra, sticks up for them against all comers: yuppie neighbours, Youth Aid, noisy Rastas and bikies, the council and "Social Bloody Welfare". No one wins and Debra, ever stretched, never quite makes ends meet.

Damien is appalled by her taste in men and he craftily sees them off. But the latest, Horse Horsfall, is a tougher proposition. Mum really fancies him and "his riches" from the car dealership and repo harvesting.

This skilfully wrought novel is narrated by Damien in the language of the schoolyard, multi-ethnic rumbles and the spacie bar.

Damien's dramas revolve around his search for his father, Frank Teariki, and its searing outcome, which edges Damien, already on the slide, into real trouble.

The story, in the voices of the boy and the pre-gentrified denizens of Kingsland, is told without sentimentality. Macrae has a perfect ear for the oral interactions. Horse's stepfather, Dougie, might rank as New Zealand's most finely realised gross literary creation. There is a lot of tenderness, too.

Publisher: Analogue

Price: $29.95

* Bernard Brown is an Auckland lawyer and poet