Hello to all our book-reading friends.
Joe Bennett comes to Wanaka
Our book event this month will be such fun. The irrepressible Joe Bennett visits from Christchurch and will talk about his love of writing and reading and the handful of writers and poets who have taught him so much. Joe discusses the concept that “good writing makes good reading" and conversely: "easy writing makes for hard reading". Joe's latest book is From There to Here - a Memoir and is available now.
Join us at 5pm for a 5.30pm start at a new venue - Upstairs in Urban Grind, Ardmore Street, Saturday, August 19, 2023.
The bar will be open to purchase refreshments. Tickets are $15 and book online or at the shop. Do get your tickets early as our last event sold out and a number of friends missed out.
Prize-winning books
The Australian book awards are always of interest to New Zealand readers and we make sure we monitor them closely. We recently received The Jaguar, the winner of the 2023 Australian Stella Prize - a prize awarded to women’s writing in fiction or non-fiction. This year's winning book is a poetry collection by Sarah Holland-Batt. The Jaguar chronicles the author's father’s life living with Parkinson’s disease, and his death. One of our book club members, Judy, said it was very thought-provoking and very moving and stayed in her thoughts for many, many days. We agree and think it is a very special collection.
The other prize winner (it will be here soon) which won the Miles Franklin award is Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens. The title makes it all sound very cosy and peachie pie. Not so. Written by Shankari Chandran, it was chosen as the: “Novel of the year of the highest literary merit which presents Australian life in any of its phases.” Please pre-order this title as the first edition has sold out in Australia and we are lucky to be getting the paperback. Here is a link to read more about it.
Murakami
Finally, do remember we are very proud of our strong collection of Murakami titles. Placed in the middle of the shop opposite the front desk you will find a stack of this intriguing Japanese author's books. Here is an interesting article on where to start your reading journey with Huraki Murakami.
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