Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper       $37.00
'I've gone. I've never seen the water, so I've gone there. I will try to remember to come back.' Etta's greatest unfulfilled wish, living in the rolling farmland of Saskatchewan, is to see the sea. And so, at the age of eighty-two, she gets up early one morning, takes a rifle, some chocolate and her best boots, and begins walking the 2,000 miles to the water. But Etta is starting to forget things. Her husband, Otto, remembers everything, and he loves her. Their neighbour Russell remembers too, but differently - and he still loves Etta as much as he did over fifty years ago, before she married Otto.
"The book succeeds brilliantly as a meditation on friendship and marriage, on bonds forged over decades." - Guardian        
"Incredibly moving, beautifully funny, luminous with wisdom. It is a book that restores one's faith even as it deepens the mystery." - Chris Cleave
>> Here is the author on a swing.

 Peru: The cookbook by Gaston Acurio     $70.00
The definitive Peruvian cookbook, featuring 500 traditional home cooking recipes from the country’s most acclaimed and popular chef, Gastón Acurio. One of the world’s most innovative and flavorful cuisines, Peruvian food has been heralded by chefs and media around the world as the "next big thing."
 "Gaston Acurio is Peru's answer to Jamie Oliver and Anthony Bourdain." - Wall Street Journal

 On Writers and Writing by Margaret Atwood       $28.00
What is the role of the writer? Prophet? High Priest of Art? Court Jester? Or witness to the real world? Looking back on her own childhood and the development of her writing career, Margaret Atwood examines the metaphors which writers of fiction and poetry have used to explain - or excuse - their activities, looking at what costumes they have seen fit to assume, what roles they have chosen to play. This insightful book was first published in 2002 as Negotiating With the Dead. 

Living in Paradox: A history of urban design across kainga, towns and cities in New Zealand by Garth Falconer        $75.00
An important, far-reaching and provocative survey of town planning (and the lack of it), looking at the impact of urban design on populations and the environment. There are alternatives to accepting soaring house prices, congested traffic, a bland and illegible urban landscape, growing gaps between different peoples, and hopelessly complicated urban planning regulations!

The Strangler Vine by M.J. Carter     $30.00
In the days of the Raj, a young lieutenant and an eccentric scholar set off from Calcutta to solve the disappearance of a novelist and India expert and get a bit too close to the Thuggee cult. Well written and thoroughly researched.
"The best unputdownable novel I've read this year so far." - Jan
"A witty and entrancing historical thriller." - Guardian
>> Interview.

 Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange       $59.99
Some of these stories, dating from at least 1000 years ago, found their way into the Arabian Nights, but each is unique and wonderful.
"Endlessly diverting and inventive, giving a unique insight into a now-lost elegant, courtly and tolerant Arab world." - William Dalrymple, Sunday Times 
"Offers a gateway to a different world of language and ideas, florid, wildly descriptive and are a powerful reminder of the human need for story. Irresistible." - Independent
"An astonishment. A profound oddity." - Scotland on Sunday

People of the Twenty-First Century by Hans Eijkelboom      $49.99
A monumental 'anti-sartorial' survey clothing from the streets of the world (Amsterdam, Paris, New York, Shanghai), nullifying the usual distinction between individual and mass choice. Interesting!

 Love and Food at Gran's Table by Natalie Oldfield      $49.99
60 New Zealand grandmothers, born all over the world, share the recipes that make their tables the centre of their families' lives. This book demonstrates the rich diversity of backgrounds and cuisines that comprise New Zealand's culinary texture. The recipes are very approachable, and the grans' biographies are both interesting and heart-warming. 
>> Grans in the kitchen.

Arab Jazz by Karim Miské         $37.99
 Kosher sushi, kebabs, a second-hand bookshop, a bar: the peace of a cosmopolitan neighbourhood in Paris's19th arrondissement in Paris is shattered when Ahmed Taroudant's daydreams are interrupted by the blood dripping from his upstairs neighbour's brutally mutilated corpse. The violent murder of Laura Vignole, and the pork joint placed next to her, set imaginations ablaze across the neighborhood, and Ahmed finds himself the prime suspect. However, detectives Rachel Kupferstein and Jean Hamelot are not short of leads... 
"Intelligent and gripping." - Tariq Ali
"Brilliant." - The Guardian
"'Exciting, informative, stimulating, and a little frightening." - The Times

The Enchanted Forest by Johanna Basford       $26.00
This stunningly beautiful colouring book takes you on a inky quest through an enchanted forest to discover what lies in the castle at its heart. As well as drawings to complete, colour and embellish, there are hidden objects to be found along the way including wild flowers, animals and birds, gems, lanterns, keys and treasure chests. Beginning at the entrance to the forest, the journey progresses through woodland, rocky caves and tree-lined mazes, over streams and a waterfall, across the trees tops, to finally reach the castle.

A Theft: My con man by Hanif Kureishi      $14.00
Nearing sixty and needing to plan for his and his children's future, Kureishi followed his accountant's advice and invested in a property scheme - only to find out that the accountant was a fraudster and his entire life savings had vanished. In this thought-provoking account of his conman, Kureishi uses this theft as a way of exploring some of the contradictions and dilemmas of our lives: the true value of money; the role of deception in art; how you can love and hate simultaneously; why the financial world seems to revolve around deceit; and what we might recover from those who have stolen from us.

The Four Books by Yan Lianke       $37.00
"A searing, allegorical view of Chinese society during some of the darkest moments of the Mao era. Yan cements his reputation as one of China's most mportant - and certainly most fearless - living writers." - Kirkus Reviews

Street Craft: Yarnbombing, guerrilla gardening, light tagging, lace graffiti and more by Riikka Kuittinen        $39.99
In the past decade, street art has transformed from a practice carried out by anonymous creators, seen by some as vandalism, into a commercial enterprise and a respectable part of the international art market. A new generation of artists is creating uncommissioned, site-specific works employing a range of art and craft techniques, including weaving, crocheting, sculpting, painting, gardening, light installation, and more. But has the market defused the subversive power of street craft?

 I Met Lucky People: The story of the Romani Gypsies by Yaron Matras      $35.00
A wonderfully comprehensive and sympathetic account of Gypsy culture and history. 

 Drone Theory by Gregoire Chamayou       $28.00
A rigorous polemic against the increasing use of robot warfare around the world. Drawing on philosophical debate, moral lessons from Greek mythology and transcripts of conversations between drone operators, Drone Theory re-evaluates the socio-political impact of drone warfare on the world - and its people.

 Nothing is True and Everything is Possible: Adventures in modern Russia by Peter Pomerantsev        $37.00
Fascinating, incisive reportage from a land "where gangsters become artists, gold‑diggers quote Pushkin and Hell's Angels hallucinate themselves as saints".
>> The author speaks and reads and occasionally scratches his head. 

Find Me by Laura van den Berg        $39.99
An ebola-like pandemic is the catalyst for a meditation on memory and our ability to hide the truth from ourselves.
"The best young writer in America." - Salon
"The novel lingers and aches in the memory." - Guardian

Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill      $24.99
Comprised of short paragraphs, observations, quotes and quips - poignant, skittish, acute or throwaway - this book contains a familiar domestic narrative, albeit one related at such speed (first uphill then down with the accelerator fully depressed) that it hardly adheres to the corners. The narrator, a writer and would-be ‘art monster’, unforeseeably marries and has a child (as tends frequently to happen to would-be art monsters), providing a husband and daughter to vie with writing for priority in her life... This excellent book was short-listed for the 2015 Folio Prize.
We still have a couple of copies of the beautiful hardback edition.

Another Great Day at Sea by Geoff Dyer       $37.00
What's it like to be a writer-in-residence aboard an aircraft carrier? What is it like to be a sloppily individualistic Englishman pitched into the deeply American world of the US Navy? Dyer records the daily life on board the USS George H.W. Bush, revealing it to be a prism for understanding a society where discipline and conformity, dedication and optimism, become forms of self-expression.

The Greatest Gatsby: A visual book of grammar by Tohby Riddle       $29.99
An enjoyable and quietly witty guide to the work words do in teams, from the wonderful Tohby Riddle.

 Airmail: Taking 'Women of Letters' to the world curate by Michaela McGuire and Marieke Hardy      $39.99
The Women of Letters literary salon has a well-known passion for correspondence. Here they have collected letters from literati and celebrities written all over the world.

The Strings of Murder by Oscar de Muriel       $35.00
Edinburgh, 1888. A violinist is murdered in his home. The dead virtuoso's maid swears she heard three musicians playing in the night. But with only one body in the locked practice room - and no way in or out - the case makes no sense. Fearing a national panic over another Ripper, Scotland Yard sends Inspector Ian Frey to investigate under the cover of a fake department specializing in the occult. However, Frey's new boss, Detective 'Nine-Nails' McGray, actually believes in such supernatural nonsense...

Hausfrau by Jill Alexander Essbaum       $35.00
A housewife with agency issues is mangled by a series of affairs in this modern-day Madame Bovary. 
>> This video of the US jacket design process is rather good. 

 Classical Literature by Richard Jenkyns     $19.99
What makes Greek and Roman literature great? How has classical literature influenced Western culture? What did Greek and Roman authors learn from each other? You will want to read a lot more Classical literature once you have read this book.

The ANZACS: An inside view of New Zealanders at Gallipoli                        $45.00
Draws on the collections of the Auckland War Memorial Museum, including photographs taken by New Zealand soldiers, to give depth and poignancy to a dark period of our history.

Clothbound by Julie Paterson     $75.00
An illustrated glimpse into the life of an artist whose fabric designs grace home furnishings the world over. Try not to drool onto the book.

 Inventing the Individual: The origins of Western liberalism by Larry Siedentop        $35.00
The discovery of individuality, human freedom and potential in the early centuries CE displaced the family, the caste and the tribe as the core elements of social organisation and moral thinking.
"Magisterial, timeless, beautifully written. Siedentop has achieved something quite extraordinary. He has explained us to ourselves." - Spectator

 Snail, Where Are You? by Tomi Ungerer     $26.00
Ha! There so are many places a snail can hide!

Goodbye Sweetheart by Marion Halligan        $37.00
When a successful lawyer, bon vivant, and loving husband and father has a heart attack and drowns in the local swimming pool, the dark secrets of his life start floating to the surface.

Great Garden Design: Contemporary inspiration for outdoor spaces by Ian Hodgson      $59.99
 The best garden designs of the last ten years from more than fifty top garden designers. It offers design solutions for every situation, every area, all tastes and budgets, and any size of garden.

The Umbrian Supper Club by Marlena de Blasi        $36.99
A small group of Umbrian women - sometimes with their men and, as often, without them - gather in an old stone house in the hills above Orvieto to cook, to sit down to a beautiful supper, to drink their beloved local wines. And to talk. During the gathering, the preparation, the cooking and the eating, they recount the memories and experiences of their gastronomic lives and, as much, of their more personal histories. De Blasi recounts four wonderful years of this.

The Zumbo Files: Unlocking the secret recipes of a master patissier by Adriano Zumbo       $69.99
Fifty sweet recipes bearing Zumbo's trademark idiosyncratic stamp.

Girl in the Dark by Anna Lyndsey       $35.00
The author suddenly developed an extreme sensitivity to light. Consequently her life became very different in many (sometimes quite unexpected) ways. How did she cope?

 We Are Our Brains: From the womb to alzheimer's by Dick Swaab      $35.00
"Wide-ranging, fun and informative. As an ice-breaker at parties, it is unmatched." - Sunday Times

 Dead Wake: The last crossing of the Lusitania by Erik Larson         $45.00
Racing towards Liverpool a hundred years ago, the Lusitania was hunted by Unterseeboot-20. This is a vivid recreation of the fateful day they met.

Ransacking Paris by Patti Miller        $37.00
Having grown up in the Australian outback, Miller suddenly finds herself in Paris for a year. Luckily, she falls in with Montaigne, Rousseau and de Beauvoir, who are both helpful guides and thoughtful companions.

Use Your Imagination! (But be careful what you wish for) by Nicola O'Byrne       $19.99
Rabbit is bored. Wolf has the perfect solution. 'Why not write a story?' he says. Wolf teaches Rabbit how to construct a story, but Wolf is hungry and they disagree how the story should end...

Spice I Am: Home-style Thai recipes by Sujet Saenkham      $49.99
Learn how to make restaurant favourites such as stir-fried crispy pork belly with basil, roasted red duck curry with eggplant, tomato and pineapple and crispy prawn and lemongrass salad, as well as traditional classics like pad Thai, fishcakes and a massaman beef curry.

Touch: The science of hand, heart and mind by David Linden     $39.99
“Touch is not optional for human development. From consumer choice to sexual intercourse, from tool use to chronic pain to the process of healing, the genes, cells and neural circuits involved in the sense of touch have been crucial to creating our unique human experience.” - David Linden
"Engrossing." - Guardian

Monster by Michael Rosen and Neal Layton       $19.99
When his pet human goes to school, Monster thinks she is trapped there against her will, and he sets out to rescue her!
"A delight." - Independent

Shed Décor: How to decorate and furnish your favourite garden room by Sally Coulthard        $59.99
The title is not an oxymoron! Your shed, no matter what you use it for, is ripe for an aesthetic all of its own.
If you liked Gill Heriz's A Woman's Shed, you will want to clutch this book.

Rich Man Road by Ann Glamunzina         $29.99
 A traumatised Dalmatian immigrant, Olga, arrives in New Zealand after WWII from the refugee camps of Egypt.  Her fraught relationship with her mother and the choices Olga makes isolate her from her family.  It is not until she meets the much younger and vulnerable Samoan immigrant, Pualele, that Olga finds someone who might understand her.

Proust's Overcoat: The true story of one man's passion for all things Proust by Lorenza Foschini         $26.00
An obsessive bibliophile makes the acquaintance of Proust's brother and begins a decades-long accumulation of the writer's personal effects, culminating in the ratty otter-lined overcoat that Marcel spread over himself when he wrote. Fascinating.
"Proust's Overcoat is just my style." - Patti Smith

Auschwitz Report by Primo Levi and Leonardo de Benedetti      $24.00
While in a Russian-administered holding camp in Poland in 1945, Levi was asked to provide a report on living conditions in Auschwitz. Published the following year, it was then forgotten, and has until now remained unknown to a wider public. Dating from the weeks immediately after the war, Auschwitz Report details the authors' harrowing deportation to Auschwitz, and how those who disembarked from the train were selected for work or extermination. As well as being a searing narrative of everyday life in the camp, and the organization and working of the gas chambers, it constitutes Levi's first lucid attempts to come to terms with the raw horror of events that would drive him to write his other works. 

 We Are Pirates by Daniel Handler         $36.99
A teenage girl pulls together a ragtag crew to commit mayhem in the San Francisco Bay, while her hapless father tries to get her home.
"Honest and funny, dark and painful, We Are Pirates reads like the result of a nightmarish mating experiment between Joseph Heller and Captain Jack Sparrow. It's the strangest, most brilliant offering yet from the mind behind Lemony Snicket." - Neil Gaiman 
"Daniel Handler turns whimsy into wisdom and the fantastic into the great. He is, of course, a genius." - Lorrie Moore

 I Am Radar by Reif Larsen        $38.00
The new novel from the author of The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet.
How far do you need to travel to know yourself? In 1975, a black child is mysteriously born to white parents. Falling in with a secretive group of puppeteers and scientists, he is soon forced to confront the true nature of his identity. His story rapidly becomes entangled with events stretching from Belgrade in a time of siege to arctic Norway, from pre-Khmer Rouge Cambodia to modern-day Congo. It takes in quantum physics, forgotten history, puppetry and human experience.

 The Offering by Grace McCleen      $38.00
A novel taut with foreboding, misled innocence and a heartbreakingly damaged psyche.
"That McCleen is a writer of exceptional gifts is beyond doubt. Her prose can soar in moments of breathtaking beauty, most particularly when she turns a poet’s eye on the landscape, though a minor criticism is that there’s a surfeit of these passages. But she writes equally viscerally about her narrator’s emotional terrain, depicting claustrophobia, shame and terror so painfully it makes your skin itch." - Guardian

 The Boy Who Could See Death by Salley Vickers     $45.00
Stories of the uncanny and the unexpected, exploring bereavement and betrayal, closely guarded secrets and common gossip, long-overdue endings and decidedly strange beginnings.
"Salley Vickers sees with a clear eye and writes with a light hand - she knows how the world works. She is a presence worth cherishing." - Philip Pullman

 Vivienne's Blog by Stephen K. Leaton      $35.00
What is real? What is fantasy? What is insanity? A woman convinced she is descended from faeries, and obsessed with her ex-partner and his wife, writes him letters and a blog filled with longing, anger, threats and bitterness.
"The narrator may be unreliable, but the stories she tells, as well as her own, are infinitely appealing." - Kirkus Reviews
>> The author on the radio.  

 The Sustainable Design Book by Rebecca Proctor      $69.99
An exciting survey of over 300 products showcasing the latest developments in green design, interviews with designers about green practice, and a consideration of the properties and applications of sustainable materials.

Future Crimes: A journey to the dark side of technology - and how to survive it by Marc Goodman        $37.00
Criminals are often the earliest, and most innovative, adopters and adapters of technology. Today's criminals are stealing identities, draining online bank-accounts and wiping out computer servers. It's disturbingly easy to activate baby cam monitors to spy on families, pacemakers can be hacked to deliver a lethal jolt, and thieves are analyzing your social media in order to determine the best time for a home invasion. Meanwhile, 3D printers produce AK-47s, terrorists can download the recipe for the Ebola virus, and drug cartels are building drones. 

Dancing in the Dark ('My Struggle' #4) by Karl Ove Knausgaard       $38.00
 The fourth part of Knausgaard's astoundingly compelling struggle to burst the novel form by over-packing it with detail. His omnivorous "autobiography" began with A Death in the Family, and treats the meaningful and the meaningless with equal penetration, placing it somewhere between Proust and reality television. 
"Perhaps the most important literary enterprise of our times." - Guardian
"Even when I was bored I was interested." - James Wood 

 To the Rescue by Stephen Biesty      $37.00
Look inside an ambulance, police car, fire engine, rescue helicopter, lifeboat and more to find out their inner workings. With over 40 flaps to lift!

Elusive Peace: A kiwi peacekeeper in Angola by John McLeod      $39.99
 In 1998 McLeod served as a United Nations Military Observer, monitoring the fraught Angolan peace process. Achieving peace in that war-wracked country proved elusive, and the violence and bloodshed he experienced affected him deeply. It has taken a long time for John to be able to tell his story, which graphically reveals the disturbing realities of modern peacekeeping - and its far-reaching impact on those at the front line.

 Accidence Will Happen: The non-pedantic guide to English usage by Oliver Kamm      $39.99
Does the language need to relax a bit to flourish? This book will either excite you or drive you mad. 

 It's the End of the World as We Know It by Saci Lloyd       $19.99
When teenager Mikey Malone gets sucked through a wormhole into this parallel world, he discovers a power-crazed corporation is planning to use Earth as a dumping ground for an uncontrollable poisonous algae. It's a race against time for Mikey and his rebel friends to stop the ruthless tyrants from getting their way. 

One of Us: The story of Anders Breivik and the massacre in Norway by Asne Seierstad         $39.99

 Summer in the Shadow of Byron by Andrew McConnell-Stott       $29.99
What happens if you shut Lord Byron, Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, John Polidori and Claire Clairmont in a villa on Lake Geneva for the summer? The string of Romantic masterworks (including Frankenstein) is just one of the results...

Mt John, The first 50 years: A celebration of half a century of optical astronomy at the University of Canterbury by John Hearnshaw and Alan Gilmore      $59.99
Mt John University Observatory was founded in 1965 at Lake Tekapo in the Mackenzie Basin to take advantage of the favourable conditions for astronomy. Telescopes were installed, and in 1981 a lighting ordinance helped protect the site from light pollution. Mt John is both a research observatory and a mecca for stargazing astro-tourists.

 Tangerine: 25 insights into extraordinary innovation and design by Antonia Higgs        $65.00
25 design case-studies drawn from the 25 year history of the leading design consultancy.

Dictionary of Slang in New Zealand by Noel Kelly       $59.99
Kelly has applied a verbal vacuum cleaner to every corner of current New Zealand usage, spoken, printed, txtd, shouted, muttered or tweeted. 

Brockie: A memoir in words, cartoons and sketches by Bob Brockie       $39.99
The cartoonist, author and science columnist looks back over eighty years of eventful life, and shares his diaries and sketchbooks.

The King and the Sea by Heinz Janisch and Wolf Erlbruch  $19.99
“I am the king!" said the king. The sea answered with a whoosh.
The little king wants to control his world: the sea, the cloud, the rain, a bee, a trumpet, a pencil, but his world has other ideas and the king learns to soften his relationship with it and accept the way it governs itself. A thoughtful, subtle picture book with illustrations by Erlbruch (Duck, Death and the Tulip). As soon as you have finished you will want to start reading it again.

Marshlands by Matthew Olshan     $19.99
Unexpectedly released after many years of ill-treatment, an aging prisoner finds refuge at a museum which is exhibiting a replica of the Marshlands, in which the prisoner had spent some time as a doctor among the despised and feared Marshmen. Suddenly the novel turns inside out and begins to run backwards. What is the crime that was committed, and why has the doctor been imprisoned? 
"Olshan's prose, so spare and unsentimental, and the book's fraught political atmosphere, so coolly rendered, are remarkably reminiscent of J.M. Coetzee's work, as is the strange, almost fairy-tale quality of a story at once so specific in its details and so general in its detachment from any particular time or place." - The Minneapolis Star Tribune

Reading the World: Confessions of a literary explorer by Ann Morgan       $49.99
Morgan decided to spend a year reading a book from each country of the world. How did she get on? Why are some countries better represented in English translation than others? What concepts of culture or identity were challenged by her reading? How many different countries have you read books from? (You might be surprised how few). 
>> She blogged. 

 Vixen by Rosie Garland         $19.99
Devon, 1349. The villagers of Brauntone are awaiting a sign. As they haul a stinking creature from the nets, new priest Father Thomas thinks it has finally come. In the hands of his young housekeeper, Anne, this creature is revealed as just a girl, but in the mind of Father Thomas she is to be so much more than that. And he will stake all but his own life on that as the Plague rages towards Brauntone and its people turn to him to save them.
"Poetic, surprising, sexy and ultimately deeply moving, Vixen will have you hooked... it will stay with you long after you've reached the final page." - Diva

 Death and Forgiveness by Jindra Ticha        $30.00
Ticha fled Czechoslovakia after the 1968 Russian invasion and settled in New Zealand. She returned on the first day of the Velvet Revolution in 1989, and since then she has had 18 books published in Czech while continuing to live in New Zealand. In this thoughtful book, her first novel written in English, she tells of a woman who returns to Prague to nurse her dying mother, having fled Czechoslovakia and settling in New Zealand following the 1968 Russian Invasion. How has exile changed the way she thinks? What reverberations alter the patterns of a life and the relationships that comprise it?

Mr Selden's Map of China: The spice trade, a lost chart and the South China Sea by Timothy Brook      $29.99
In 1659, a vast and unusual map of China arrived in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. It was bequeathed by John Selden, a London business lawyer, political activist, former convict, MP and the city's first Orientalist scholar. Largely ignored, it remained in the bowels of the library, until called up by an inquisitive reader. When Timothy Brook saw it in 2009, he realised that the Selden Map was 'a puzzle that had to be solved': an exceptional artefact, so unsettlingly modern-looking it could almost be a forgery. But it was genuine, and what it has to tell us is astonishing.

The Book of Palms by C.F.P. von Martius        $49.99
On December 13, 1868, Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius, Professor of Botany at the University of Munich and director of the Royal Botanic Garden, was carried to his grave in a coffin covered with fresh palm leaves. The fronds were a reference to his groundbreaking Natural History of Palms (1823–1853). This book reproduces all 240 stunning chromolithographs from the original three volumes, including the South American scenes. 

So You've Been Publicly Shamed by John Ronson       $35.00
Shame is one of the most underappreciated societal and historical forces. Ronson travelled the world to meet people who have been publicly shamed. How did shame affect them? How much are we motivated (or curtailed) by the fear of shame?
"Superb and terrifying." - Guardian

Falling Out of Time by David Grossman      $27.00
Grossman's genre-defying drama - part play, part prose, pure poetry - tells the story of bereaved parents setting out to reach their lost children. Written following the death of his own son, this book is an expression of the depth of human feeling - grief, tenderness, anger - that overwhelms and re-orders ordinary concerns following the death of a loved one.
"A harrowing testimony to grief. It's a measure of Grossman's clarity of thought and his theatrical timing that one reaches its end and feels, in some small way, glad to have been in his characters' company however grim the road they travel." - Glasgow Sunday Herald

The Utopia of Rules: On technology, stupidity and the secret joys of bureaucracy  by David Graeber       $38.00
Where does the desire for endless rules, regulations, and bureaucracy come from? How did we come to spend so much of our time filling out forms? To answer these questions, anthropologist David Graeber author of the excellent Debt: The first 5000 years, takes a journey through ancient and modern history to trace the peculiar and fascinating evolution of bureaucracy over the ages. 

 Dreams of Freedom, In words and pictures      $29.99
A lovely inspirational picture book produced by Amnesty International to promulgate the importance of different kinds of freedom. Short texts by Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Harriet Tubman, Anne Frank, the Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi and Malala Yousafzai (and others) have been illustrated by Alexis Deacon, Chris Riddell, Jackie Morris, Birgitta Sif, Oliver Jeffers (and others).

 Whipping Boy: The forty-year search for my twelve-year-old bully by Allen Kurzwell      $37.00
A fascinating account of the author's lengthy search for the boy who made his life hell at school.  

My Abuelo's Mexican Feast: A life and love of Mexican food by Daniella Germain    $39.99
An illustrated journey back to Mexico's past, tracing the life of Daniella Germain's Abuelo (grandfather) and his love affair with food. Beautifully illustrated throughout with hand-drawn watercolour illustrations, this book is full of very authentic and very appealing Mexican recipes.

The Well by Catherine Chanter       $37.00
A haunting novel that probes the fragility of our personal relationships and the mystical connection between people and the places they call home.
"The Well asks us where do we seek refuge, and why? And perhaps it shows us that what is left, after all is suffered, is love. Battered, weathered, at the end of the novel it comes cresting over the hill, a herald of relief. I loved this book!" - Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist

 The Faithful Couple by A.D. Miller      $38.00
A perceptive charting of a platonic friendship between two men, from their chance meeting in 1993, through girlfriends and wives, success and failure, children and bereavements. This is the story of a friendship built on a shared guilt and a secret betrayal.
"Powerful and moving. I loved The Faithful Couple." - Roddy Doyle

 Girl Runner by Carrie Snyder     $38.00
Former Olympic runner, Aganetha Smart is 104, alone in a nursing home, forgotten by family and history. Until two young strangers come and kidnap her and take her on a journey back into her past. 
"A beautiful, thoughtful homage to those forgotten women who stepped outside the boundaries of what was allotted to them, and a testament to the struggles and sacrifices that paved the way for the female athletes who followed." - Quill & Quire

 Finding Zero: A mathematician's odyssey to uncover the origins of numbers by Amir S. Aczel         $39.99
The use of numerals can be traced back through the Romans and Greeks to Babylon, but where did Arabic numerals come from? The author's search takes him to India, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and ultimately into the wilds of Cambodia. There he is amazed to find the earliest zero - the keystone of our entire system of numbers - on a crumbling, vine-covered wall of a seventh-century temple.

 Detective Gordon: The First Case by Ulf Nilsson and Gitte Spee      $19.99
Someone’s stealing nuts from the forest, and it’s up to Detective Gordon to catch the thief! Unfortunately, solving this crime means standing in the snow and waiting for a long time. If only he had an assistant – someone small, fast, and clever – to help solve this terrible case. Then Detective Gordon would be able to go back to doing what he’s best at: thinking, eating cakes, drinking tea, and stamping important papers.

 Swallow This: Serving up the food industry's darkest secrets by Joanna Blythman       $35.00
Just what goes into the food we buy? What happens in factories to make preprepared food quite unlike the food we make at home? Just what does 'natural' mean? This book will change the way you shop.

Christopher and His Kind, 1929-1939 by Christopher Isherwood      $28.00 
A candid memoir of gay Berlin in the 1930s, a pivotal decade in Isherwood's life and oeuvre. Includes much on his friends Auden, Spender and Forster. 

 King John: England, Magna Carta and the making of a tyrant by Stephen Church       $65.00

>> Historical perspicacity. 

 Mind Games by Teri Terry       $19.99
A new book from the author of the 'Slated' trilogy. 
In a future world, life is tightly controlled by the all-powerful PareCo. Standing out from the crowd is dangerous so misfit Luna hides her secrets carefully, not realising her own power. Unlike her friends and family, Luna has never been able to plug into Realtime, PareCo's virtual world, where almost everyone now lives their lives. So how do PareCo know about Luna, and why do they want her for their elite think tank?

 The Tastemaker: Carl van Vechten and the birth of modern America by Edward White        $29.99
The many lives of one of the most influential cultural impresarios of the early twentieth century: a patron and dealmaker of the Harlem Renaissance, a photographer who captured the era's icons, and a novelist who created some of the Jazz Age's most salacious stories. A close confidant of Langston Hughes, Gertrude Stein, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, van Vechten frolicked in the 1920s Manhattan demimonde, finding himself in Harlem jazz clubs, Hell's Kitchen speakeasies, and the Greenwich Village underground gay scene.

 Shrinks: The untold story of psychiatry by Jeffrey Lieberman     $39.99
 "An astonishing book: honest, sober, exciting, and humane. This book brings you to the very forefront of one of the most amazing medical journeys of our time."—Siddhartha Mukherjee, author of The Emperor of All Maladies
"Jeffrey Lieberman has produced a masterful behind-the-scenes examination of psychiatry - and, by extension, the human condition. A wise and gripping book that tackles one of the most important questions of our time: what is mental illness?" —Andrew Solomon, author of Far from the Tree and The Noonday Demon

The History of Fly Fishing in Fifty Flies by Ian Whitelaw       $39.99
Who better to tell the history of fly fishing than the flies themselves?

 Shine by Candy Gourlay       $19.99
 Monsters are in the eye of the beholder. Rosa suffers from a rare condition that renders her mute. She lives on the strange island of Mirasol where the rain never seems to stop. In the gloom of the island, its superstitious population are haunted by all sorts of fears - they shun people who suffer from Rosa's condition, believing them to be monsters. So Rosa must live hidden away in an isolated house with its back to the rest of the world, with only the internet for a social life. When she meets Ansel95 online, she realises she has found a friendship that must take place in the real world.
"A precious and important novel." - Guardian

Love in the Time of Contempt: Consolations for parents of teenagers by Joanne Fedler       $35.00
You are not alone. What is it about parenting, especially parenting of teenagers, that causes you to doubt your own values and desires?

Motherless Child: The definitive biography of Eric Clapton by Paul Scott       $39.99
From the Yardbirds to Cream to his solo career, Clapton's subtle guitar has bewitched a million ears.
>> Cream, live, 1968.
>> Clapton shows how to play his Gibson SG.