Leonie Agney. Photo / Wayne Martin
Next to my bed, dozens of books lay stacked in a haphazard manner, threatening to crush my poor dog. In the interests of canine safety, I'm making fast progress and chewing through Before You Knew My Name, by Jacqueline Bublitz, because I can't resist a good mystery and the premise
of a ghost narrator had me hooked. Also, I recently finished Catherine Chidgey's Remote Sympathy, about families living beside concentration camps. For me, the lies people tell themselves make this book compelling reading.
Currently, I'm in the middle of the Master of Creative Writing course at AUT, with a focus on YA, which leads me to rave about Displaced, by Cristina Sanders, winner of the Storylines Tessa Duder Award for YA. I've often wondered about the boat journeys of early Pākehā settlers and admired Sanders' deft use of language. Likewise, I enjoyed The Calling, by Fleur Beale. Both authors create believable, strong female characters, living in New Zealand during the 19th century. As a side note, I particularly loved Beale's depiction of the real-life Suzanne Aubert, the Mother Superior who holds the record for the largest New Zealand funeral for a woman. How could I not know about her?
Finally, I loved Melinda Szymanik and Vasanti Unka's new picture book, My Elephant Is Blue for a beautiful discussion on children dealing with difficult emotions, which never felt didactic.
What else? Last week, I read the first few pages of Shilo Kino's The Pōrangi Boy and felt struck by the authentic voice, so it's waiting by my bed, alongside Adele Broadbent's If Only and Anne Kayes' In Our Own Backyard. Does that sound like a lot? There are more - and, yes, I read several books at once.
Luckily for me, the dog has excellent reflexes.
