Trifecta looks at the odds in the lives of the three children of Martin and Agnes Klepka. Martin was one of the refugees of Nazism who famously brought Modernist architecture and ‘real coffee’ to New Zealand. Many years after his early death from a heart attack, Klepka’s children are struggling in their different ways with the difficult legacy of their charismatic, overbearing father. Sandy, who was disliked by his father, is a cultural historian in the twilight of his career, disgraced, divorced and reduced to a .2 position at Auckland University. Veronica, who bored her father, is struggling with a failing art deco Napier tour company and an alcoholic husband. And Mick, Martin Klepka’s favourite, a gambling, methamphetamine and sex addict, is still living alone in the Red House, his father’s plagiarised masterpiece.
The central sequence page : stone : leaf, interspersed with the striking drawings of John Edgar, is framed by poems of growing up and growing old. They, in turn, are framed by poems written in the natural world, beside a lake and beside an ocean. At the heart of this book is urgency: the urgency to know the limits of our planet and ourselves, and to live within them.
Octopuses have varied personalities and show intelligence in myriad ways: endless trickery to escape enclosures and get food; jetting water playfully to bounce objects like balls; and evading caretakers by using a scoop net as a trampoline and running around the floor on eight arms. But with a beak like a parrot, venom like a snake, and a tongue covered with teeth, how can such a being know anything? And what sort of thoughts could it think? The more the author got on octopuses' wavelength, the more she was drawn to reconsider the strange phenomenon of consciousness.
In this collection of dark, unerring and surprising short stories, John Boyne explores the extremities of the human condition in all its brilliance and brutality: the secrets we keep and the ways in which they shape us, the impossibility of shared loss, the lengths we will go to in order to protect our families and the distance we will run to protect ourselves.
The short story is a barometer for the state and shape of literature. New American Stories presents the boldest, most innovative and most resonant fiction coming out of the American literary scene. Ben Marcus, author of The Flame Alphabet and Leaving the Sea, has here curated an anthology that gives the lay of the literary land. From established masters of the form like Don DeLillo and Lydia Davis to neoteric trailblazers such as Rebecca Curtis and Rachel B. Glaser, this collection sees Marcus trying to 'prove that the distinctions we erect between styles and approaches to fiction can be essentially meaningless'.
In this poetic and haunting tale set in contemporary Appalachia, New York Times bestselling author Ron Rash illuminates lives shaped by violence and a powerful connection to the land.
We have come to see the Holocaust as a factory of death, organised by bureaucrats. Yet by the time the gas chambers became operation more than a million European Jews were already dead: shot at close range over pits and ravines. They had been murdered in the lawless killing zones created by the German colonial war in the East, many on the fertile black earth that the Nazis believed would feed the German people. It comforts us to believe that the Holocaust was a unique event. But as Timothy Snyder shows, we have missed basic lessons of the history of the Holocaust, and some of our beliefs are frighteningly close to the ecological panic that Hitler expressed in the 1920s.
“I was born with a white beauty mark, or what others call a birthmark, covering the cornea of my right eye,” an unnamed female narrator states at the outset of this autobiographical novel.
"A remarkable exploration into sight and the perceptions of childhood. From the vantage of adulthood, on a psychoanalyst’s couch, she peers into her past, relitigating the bounds of normativity, the expectations of family, and the limits of medical science." - Bookforum
"The mouse is in a hot air balloon! He's coming closer...Wow! Now a mouse is climbing the mountain. There's a cow eating grass in a paddock, and a bear looking in the rubbish bin! That mouse's raft has sunk and now he's on an island with his bicycle and there's a shark. And he's rescued by the hot air balloon! I'm not scared of volcanoes. I like the skink and the frog the best." - Bryony (3 and a half(ish))
These natural history and medical artefacts are a perfect blend of art and science. This is an endlessly fascinating book.
"Having allergic reactions to everything makes Maddy’s life in a sealed room safe but incredibly lonely. Whilst her mother does everything to make her existence as normal as possible, Maddy is cut off from having friends, going to school and going outside. The new neighbours arrive and Maddy is fascinated by them, particularly Ollie. The character of Ollie is great – dealing with an abusive father, a mother trying to keep things together and a sister going off the rails, Ollie seems to manage to keep his life together in his own zany way. He’s a character straight out of a John Green novel: completely likeable and endearing. So how could Maddy not fall for him and vice versa? The climax comes when Maddy’s mother discovers the intensifying relationship. Will Maddy risk everything for this boy? Read and find out." - Stella
All four volumes of this classic unsurpassed depiction of the human body in all its fascinating parts. A wonderful book.
Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century pushed inequality to the forefront of international public debate. Now translated into English for the first time, this book explains how inequality evolves and how economists measure it, explores variances in income and ownership of capital and the variety of policies used to reduce or exploit these gaps. Piketty also examines the effects of different systems of taxation, the distinction between historical and political time, the impact of education and technological change, the nature of capital markets, the role of unions, and the apparent tensions between the pursuit of efficiency and the pursuit of fairness.
When war broke out in September 1939, it was deeply unpopular in Germany. Yet without the active participation and commitment of the German people, it could not have continued for almost six years. What, then, was the war Germans thought they were fighting?
A taut and informed legal thriller concerning border disputes in Africa. But national borders are not the only ones to be violated...
"This young adult novel by a twice book-award-winner is a gritty read. Amazingly well-written, it is the story of 18-year-old Emma. Emma is a good student who can breeze through classes without swotting, is popular and is good looking. The book has a lead-up to a night where things happen that she can't remember, and photos get posted onto social networking media. The rest of the book deals with the aftermath of that night." - Peter
The greatest mass extinction in Earths history happened some 251 million years ago. In this cataclysm at least 90 per cent of life was killed, both on land and in the sea, almost bringing evolution to a halt. What caused destruction on such an unimaginable scale? Was it the impact of a huge meteorite, or prolonged volcanic eruption in Siberia?
Life on planet earth is not weirder than we imagine. It's weirder than we are capable of imagining.And we're all in it together: humans, blue whales, rats, birds of paradise, ridiculous numbers of beetles, molluscs the size of a bus, bdelloid rotifers who haven't had sex for millions of years and creatures called water bears: you can boil them, freeze them and fire them off into space without killing them.
A real-life detective story, investigating how Agatha Christie and colleagues in a mysterious literary club transformed crime fiction, writing books casting new light on unsolved murders whilst hiding clues to their authors' darkest secrets. This is the first book about the Detection Club, the world's most famous and most mysterious social network of crime writers.
These stimulating workshops are designed to spark children's imaginations, champion group bonding, and give visually pleasing results - with no artistic ability required.
Thirteen of Dahl's darkest unexpected tales, perfect for teen readers.
The Empire City traces the history of Wellington, from the middle of the 19th Century till the present day. Stories are told through song, text, paintings and photographs and offer a creative insight into the history of life in the capital city.
The book includes a CD with original songs by Andrew Laking, and features a number of exceptional guest artists including Bret McKenzie, Riki Gooch, Toby Laing, Norman Meehan and Justin Firefly.
What can be told about love, and what cannot?
This beautiful, insightful and poignant book presents Mollisons large format photographs of children's bedrooms around the world including from the USA, Mexico, Brazil, England, Italy, Israel and the West Bank, Kenya, Senegal, Lesotho, Nepal, China and India alongside portraits of the children whose bedrooms are featured. Each pair of photographs is accompanied by an extended caption that tells of the story of the child in question.
Meet Minny: her life is a complicated whirlwind of unbearable PE lessons, annoying friends and impossible-to-live-with siblings. Minny is desperate for some space in a house spilling over with family and hangers-on. She has to contend with her autistic sister Aisling's school bullies, whilst trying to keep her self-absorbed BFF Penny happy, and look normal in front of new boy Franklin. And on top of this, now Dad has announced that he's returning to London - with his new girlfriend.
A new James Bond novel, with original material by Ian Fleming.
Lose weight and keep it off without a fad diet but by eating the delicious nutritious meals in this book.
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