Ripiro Beach - A Memoir of Life after Near Death by Caroline Barron

$35.00 NZD

Category: Biography / Memoir

Does DNA write our destinies? Or do the hands that nurture triumph over nature? What is it that determines who we really are? Caroline Barron's father never found his birth mother. After he dies suddenly on her twentieth birthday, Caroline develops an insidious fear of her own untimely death. When she n early bleeds out on an operating table during childbirth, it almost seems her greatest fear is justified. Emerging from the experience a changed woman, Caroline spends the next six years poring over her family history in an attempt to make sense of her inexplicable rage. The family secrets she unearths threaten to destabilise her identity and carefully built life, eventually leading her to Northland's rugged Ripiro Beach, where past and present dramatically collide. Ripiro Beach is a beautifully written, relentlessly honest memoir about one woman's determination to gather the threads of a life that has come undone. ...Show more

Going by Train - The Complete New Zealand Railways Story by Graham Hutchins

$60.00 NZD

Category: Transport

Railways played a pivotal part in the development of New Zealand's economy, towns and cities, and helped shape a distinctive culture. This is a comprehensive account of our railways story, from the earliest days of the colony, through rail's growth and golden days, slow decline and recent resurgence. Go ing by Train details New Zealand's railway development from its beginnings to completion of the main trunk, provincial and urban networks and the numerous branch lines reaching far-flung corners of the country. By the 1930s and '40s, railways dominated travel and became part of the national way of life, with trains for all passengers and occasions. Graham Hutchins, who grew up in a railway town and spent many years working on the railways, recounts the locomotives, the lines, the people and personalities in rail's colourful history. With competition from road transport, rail's golden glow began to fade, with line closures, corporatisation and reduced investment. But with renewed interest, its time has come again, with growth in tourist and commuter travel, line redevelopment and heritage restoration. This fully illustrated work gives excellent coverage of local rail's tribulations, triumphs and tragedies, written in a very readable style. Rail fans and general readers alike will enjoy its wide-ranging topics, generous illustrations, anecdotes and personal accounts. ...Show more

Aue by Becky Manawatu

$35.00 NZD

Category: NZ Fiction

Winner! of the Ockham NZ Book Awards - Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction 2020. Taukiri was born into sorrow. Auē can be heard in the sound of the sea he loves and hates, and in the music he draws out of the guitar that was his father's. It spills out of the gang violence that killed his father and sent his mother into hiding, and the shame he feels about abandoning his eight-year-old brother to another violent home. But Arama is braver than he looks, and he has a friend and his friend has a dog, and the three of them together might just be strong enough to turn back the tide of sorrow. As long as there's aroha to give and stories to tell and a good supply of plasters. Here is a novel that is both raw and sublime, a compelling new voice in New Zealand fiction. Haere mai, Becky Manawatu. ...Show more

The Girl in the Mirror by Rose Carlyle

$33.00 NZD

Category: NZ Fiction

An edge-of-your-seat debut thriller with identical twins, a crazy inheritance and a boat full of secrets. Who can you trust? Absolutely nobody! Identical twins only look the same… Beautiful twin sisters Iris and Summer are startlingly alike, but beyond what the eye can see lies a darkness that se ts them apart. Cynical and insecure, Iris has long been envious of open-hearted Summer's seemingly never-ending good fortune, including her perfect husband, Adam. Called to Thailand to help sail the family yacht to the Seychelles, Iris nurtures her own secret hopes for what might happen on the journey. But when she unexpectedly finds herself alone in the middle of the Indian Ocean, everything changes. Now is her chance to take what she's always wanted - the idyllic life she's always coveted. But just how far will she go to get the life she's dreamed about? And how will she make sure no one discovers the truth? Written with the chilling suspense of The Girl on the Train and Before I Go to Sleep, The Girl in the Mirror is an addictive thriller about greed, lust, secrets and deadly lies. ...Show more

Gottfried Lindauer's New Zealand: The Maori Portraits (Paperback Edition) by Ngahiraka Mason and Zara Stanhope (editors)

$60.00 NZD

Category: Pukapuka Aotearoa

An exquisite piece of art publishing that showcases Bohemian artist Gottfried Lindauer’s New Zealand in 75 plates and detailed contextual essays. From the 1870s to the early twentieth century, the Bohemian immigrant artist Gottfried Lindauer travelled to marae and rural towns around New Zealand a nd – commissioned by Māori and Pākehā – captured in paint the images of key Māori figures. For Māori then and now, the faces of tūpuna are full of mana and life. Now this definitive book on Lindauer’s portraits of the ancestors collects that work for New Zealanders.The book presents 67 major portraits and 8 genre paintings alongside detailed accounts of the subject and work, followed by essays by leading scholars that take us inside Lindauer and his world: from his artistic training in Bohemia to his travels around New Zealand as Māori and Pākehā commissioned him to paint portraits; his artistic techniques and deep relationship with photography; Henry Partridge’s gallery of Lindauer works on Queen Street in Auckland where Māori visited to see their ancestors; and the afterlife of the paintings in marae and memory. For Māori, the faces that look out from Lindauer’s portraits are tribal leaders and family members. They are tohunga and politicians. They are ancestors and friends. Gottfried Lindauer met Maori tūpuna at the most basic level of human connection by capturing their likeness. This book returns the ancestors and the artist to the people. ...Show more

Aspiring by Damien Wilkins

$23.00 NZD

Category: Young Adult

An engaging, funny and moving novel about a boy trying to make sense of it all. Fifteen-year-old Ricky lives in Aspiring, a town that’s growing at an alarming rate. Ricky’s growing, too — 6’7”, and taller every day. But he’s stuck in a loop: student, uncommitted basketballer, and puzzled son, burdened b y his family’s sadness. And who’s the weird guy in town with a chauffeur and half a Cadillac? What about the bits of story that invade his head? Uncertain what’s real — and who he is — Ricky can’t stop sifting for clues. He has no idea how things will end up . . . With sunlight, verve and humour, award-winning writer Damien Wilkins brings us a beguiling boy who’s trying to make sense of it all. ...Show more

Buller's Birds of New Zealand by Geoff Norman

$60.00 NZD

Category: NZ Fauna

This accessible new edition of the award-winning classic Buller’s Birds of New Zealand includes the complete set of 95 artworks from both editions of A History of the Birds of New Zealand by Walter Buller and the subsequent supplement, specially photographed and reproduced in full colour using hig h quality modern printing techniques. Each bird painting is accompanied by a selection of Buller’s original, descriptive text as well as up-to-date taxonomic information in English and te reo Māori. Uniquely, Buller’s Birds of New Zealand features fresh reproductions of the original watercolour-and-pencil paintings for Buller’s iconic second edition and its supplement, made possible by the author’s rediscovery of these works at the Ornithological Branch of the British Natural History Museum. Bright, luminous and clear, Keulemans’s masterpieces are seen here for the first time as the artist intended. With a foreword by Stephen Fry and an introduction that traces the history of ornithological painting, and tells the story of Buller and his talented artist, this definitive book will appeal to all those who love New Zealand’s unique avifauna. ...Show more

Sixteen Days in Sikkim - Things to Do While Walking Downhill by Antony B. Shadbolt

$20.00 NZD

Category: Travel

Historic Sheep Stations of New Zealand by Colin Wheeler

$100.00 NZD

Category: Farming

A glorious new edition of Colin Wheeler's seminal books on the historic sheep stations of New Zealand Between 1967 and 1972, Colin Wheeler visited 60 of New Zealand's historic sheep stations across the North and South Islands. Travelling thousands of kilometres with his wife, Phyllis, the pair went to p laces rarely seen by the outside world. It was a time when sheep farming was the most important agricultural industry in New Zealand, yet these stations remained some of the most isolated communities in the country. Colin spent month after month drawing, painting and writing about what he saw and the people he met: the interiors of old cottages, blacksmith's shops, rabbiting huts, sod-walled school houses, grand homesteads, bailing hooks, sack needles, hand shears, wool wagons, shepherds, musterers and cooks. The Wheelers forded swift and treacherous rivers, hard against the main divide; stood for days in deep snow; sat in heavy frost; encountered sea-mist, heavy dews and fierce nor'westers. Fifty years since the publication of Historic Sheep Stations of the South Island, this new edition features all three of Colin Wheeler's original books. It is a remarkable survey of our heartland and a unique record of New Zealand's back-country life. ...Show more

Dog Zen: Everything You Need to Know to Transform Your Dog by Mark Vette

$45.00 NZD

Category: Dogs

World-renowned dog behaviourist and psychologist Mark Vette (of Driving Dogs and Flying Dogs fame) shows you how to transform your dog and create a harmonious life-long bond. This book looks at how the dog evolved from the wolf, and the ancient co-evolved bond that exists between humans and dogs, before explaining how to get your dog into a fundamental calm 'learning state' so you can encourage the behaviours you want from your pet. Mark then explains how to train your new puppy, and if you have an older dog that wasn't trained properly at that crucial early stage, how to correct each of the top ten behavioural problems that occur. Drawing from Mark's own life and experiences there are case studies throughout with beautiful photographs of these amazing animals. The top ten problems are- 1. Hyperactivity 2. Phobias 3. Excessive submission 4. Dog-to-dog aggression 5. Dog-to-human aggression 6. Barking 7. Separation distress 8. House training 9. Destructive behaviours 10.Recall This book is absolutely packed with information. It is a comprehensive practical guide combining the latest cognitive science with modern, loving, training techniques. ...Show more

Is It Bedtime Yet? Parenting ... the Hilarious, the Hair-raising, the Heart-breaking by Emily Writes

$35.00 NZD

Category: Parenting

A collection of writings on being a parent in Aotearoa - from hilarious to heart-breaking. The experience of parenthood is different for everyone. And every day can be different too. Read a hilarious and moving collection of perspectives from the well-loved Emily Writes and her friends. Some of them ar e experienced writers, others have put pen to paper for the first time. If it takes a village to raise a child, then this writing comes from the whole village. Yet every experience is a real one, and you will feel the joy, the horror, the love and the heart-ache as you read about birthday parties, vasectomies, hugs, hospitals and, of course, sleepless nights.                ...Show more

Tohora: The Southern Right Whale (PB) by Ned Barraud

$20.00 NZD

Category: Animals

Once, the mighty tohora, or southern right whale, was a common sight in winter off the coast of Aotearoa. But it proved to be an easy target for the 19th-century whalers, and was soon driven to the edge of extinction. In the 20th century, however, it became a protected species, and once commercial whali ng was virtually stopped, the southern right whale made a comeback. Ned Barraud recounts this moving story in this beautifully illustrated book, a heartening and optimistic tale for every New Zealand child. ...Show more