Author: Anna Smaill. Reviewer: Ruth Spencer.

‘Bird Life’s clipped sentences, taut and crisp, have a spare Japanese aesthetic, like haiku. There is delicate lyrical beauty, precise detail and stark contrasts, like the strange shack of the animal vendor on the roof of the luxury department store where Yasuko goes to find birds and beetles for her rituals.’

November 2023 release

Author: James Russell. Reviewer: Sofia Glucina.

‘I would recommend this book to kids 9 - 13, and people who like dramatic fiction. You don’t have to particularly like history to enjoy it. I find history boring but the Children of the Rush series made me want to learn more. It was interesting, fun, dark and heartwarming.’

September 2023 release

Author: Adrienne Jansen. Reviewer: Jessie Neilson.

‘Adrienne Jansen’s work is poignant. There is no getting away from the all too believable grief and we feel much sympathy for the plights of all our four. With an extensive and detailed narrative, it is easy to be drawn in.’

October 2023 release

Author: Rushi Vyas. Reviewer: Siobhan Harvey.

‘Originally from the United States, Vyas’ composes a work in which an instance of traumatic personal loss acts as a starting point to poetically examine and dismantle the private and public impacts of British colonialism, American imperialism, patriarchy and caste hierarchies. The result is a politically charged meditation upon the world we live in and the world we might bequeath to those who come after us..’

September 2023 release

Author: Kelley Tantau. Reviewer: Jessie Neilson.

‘Kelley Tantau sets a quiet but suspenseful pace from the first page. The parochial setting will be familiar to all readers, where derelict houses sit on streets alongside rundown motels, where those down on their luck have wound up.’

September 2023 release

Author: Tim Jones. Reviewer: Greg Fleming.

‘The devastating results of climate change are clear and obvious - but how does a writer, let alone a writer slash activist, fashion a compelling thriller from the subject? ’

September 2023 release

Author: Bill Nelson. Reviewer: Vaughan Rapatahana.

‘I enjoyed reading this slim volume. Why? Not just because the plot momentum and machination transported me swiftly through the pages, augmented as they are by much of the script being written in unrhyming free verse, but because Nelson writes well, scribes skilfully. The book is easy to explore.’

September 2023 release

Authors: Various. Reviewer: Dionne Christian.

Pictures books to let the imaginations of young readers take flight.

August - October 2023 releases

Author: Latika Vasil. Reviewer: Crissi Blair.

‘The World I Found is Wellington author Latika Vasil’s first YA novel, and she’s included a lot of her local landscape here. She’s had a number of short stories published, and I look forward to seeing her fiction repertoire grow and develop.’

September 2023 release

Author: Emma Ling Sidnam. Reviewer: Renee Liang.

‘Like many first novels, Backwaters feels as if it slices very close to personal truths – non-fiction wrapped and teased in layers of fiction - but Sidnam employs deft skill and assurance as well as lightness of touch.’

September 2023 release

Author: Michaela Keeble. Illustrator: Tokerau Brown. Reviewer: Dionne Christian.

Paku Manu Ariki Whakatakapōkai is philosophical, smart, wry and highly recommended.

September 2023 release

Author: Nicholas Sheppard. Reviewer: David Herkt.

‘Moving with a relentless and increasing sense of foreboding, Nicholas Sheppard’s How To Disappear Completely is an extensive diagnosis of a disturbing disorder in recent American life. It is not a novel where the ends are neatly tied – instead it opens a social and psychological world to exploration.’

September 2023 release

Nā Paula Morris i ētita me Darryn Joseph. Nā Mikaia Leach I arotake.

‘Ko tā Hiwa he pōhiri i te kaipānui ki te ao o ngā kaituhi (Māori) tautōhito, tautata hoki.’

’Hiwa beckons the reader to the world of both known and new Māori writers.’

Nā Te Haumihiata Mason i whakamāori. Nā Racheal McGarvey i arotake.

‘Ko te paki mō te aroha aukati me ngā whānau hoariri nō mai iho, engari ko te whakapuaki me te whakaahua i te wairua o tēnei whakaari ki te reo Māori ki tōna tino taumata e e titikaha ai ki te ngākau tangata, he tino ekenga tēra.’

‘… to articulate and illustrate the messages of this play in te reo Māori in a way that, in my opinion, resonates with te ao Māori is a feat.’

Kaituhi: Monty Soutar. Nā Dan Rabarts i arotake.

‘I ētahi wā he whanokē ngā kōrero pono i ngā kōrero paki, ā, he pērā rawa ngā kōrero a Tākuta Monty Soutar i roto i tana pakimaero tuatahi e whakaatu ana he whakatumatuma, he taumaha ake pea te hītori i te pakiwaitara.’

‘…Dr Monty Soutar has demonstrated in this impressive first novel that history, likewise, can be more confronting, and more challenging, than fiction.’

Author: Suzanne Frankham. Reviewer: David Gadd.

Engaging characters and a puzzle that gets murkier the deeper police dig make this tightly written murder mystery just what you want in crime fiction - a story told so well that you want to keep reading it in one go.

May 2023 release

Author: Carl Nixon. Reviewer: Ruth Spencer.

Immersive, incisive and beautiful, The Waters is a gradually unfolding tale of shifting sympathies and nuance, involving you intimately in the family’s fate.

August 2023 release

Author: Airana Ngarewa. Reviewer: Jack Remiel Cottrell.

The Bone Tree is an exquisitely written book, the story of two boys – Kauri and Black – and the depth of secrets that have been hidden from them their entire lives.

August 2023 release

Author: Charlotte Lobb. Reviewer: Dionne Christian.

Author Charlotte Lobb has been open about writing Hannah & Huia to highlight mental health topics and to provide hope for those in need. To succeed, one needs a strong story that resonates with readers and, for me, there must be hope alongside the heartbreak. Hannah & Huia more than hits the mark.

July 2023 release

“One thing I learnt real fast is that you don’t go in there and make it look like a formal learning environment. You have to go into their space, acknowledge it is their space and get down to their level…” 

Te Awhi Rito Reading Ambassadors Alan Dingley (current) and Ben Brown (former) have had more opportunity than most to talk with rangatahi about books, reading and why they do – or do not – find it enjoyable…