Steve Braunias: Why Jacinda Ardern is ruining my life
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The Spinoff
13 hours ago
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Livestream and live updates from the 2025 New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults
Live updates from this year's awards by Lyric Waiwiri-Smith. You can follow the award's livestream on Youtube as well as Lyric's liveblog, underneath. The Spinoff Books section is proudly brought to you by Unity Books and Creative New Zealand. Visit Unity Books online today.
NZ Herald
a day ago
- NZ Herald
Steve Braunias: Why Jacinda Ardern is ruining my life
Polkinghorne, the book, is looking like a bestseller and quacking like a bestseller. It's been No 1 at Unity Books, No 1 at Time Out bookstore, but only as far as No 2 to date in the NielsenIQ BookScan national nonfiction charts. Damn Dame Jacinda Ardern and her memoir A for hogging the No 1 spot week after week.
The Spinoff
6 days ago
- The Spinoff
The Unity Books bestseller chart for the week ending August 8
The top 10 sales lists recorded every week at Unity Books' stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington. AUCKLAND 1 Invisible Intelligence: Why Your Child Might Not Be Failing by Welby Ings (Otago University Press, $45) Ings argues for an education system that doesn't pin children into a narrow academic view of intelligence and success. Bravo! 2 Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison (Penguin, $24) One suspects #BookTok has something to do with pinging this 1947 classic near the top of the Unity charts. 3 Aroha: Māori Wisdom for a Contented Life Lived in Harmony With Our Planet by Hinemoa Elder (Penguin, $30) Timeless yet urgent. 4 The Safe Keep by Yael van der Wouden (Penguin, $26) Perfect historical fiction. 5 The Book of Guilt by Catherine Chidgey (Te Herenga Waka University Press, $38) A spooky old house, identical triplets, medicines, Margate … don't miss this latest ripping yarn from one of the country's best storytellers. 6 James by Percival Everett (Picador, $27) Another ripping yarn that's rippling all the way to Hollywood. 7 The Unlikely Doctor by Dr Timoti Te Moke (Allen & Unwin, $38) A powerful new memoir. Here's the blurb: 'The extraordinary story of Dr Timoti Te Moke who – having endured a horrific childhood of beatings and abuse, then gang life, stints in prison and an unsupported manslaughter charge – became a doctor at the age of 56 and is a staunch advocate for Māori.' 8 Eurotrash by Christian Kracht (Serpents Tail, $30) The road trip novel about intergenerational trauma. 9 Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton (Canongate, $28) Stunning memoir of animal-human connection and transformation. 10 Rabbit Heart: A Mother's Murder, a Daughter's Story by Kristine S. Ervin (Counterpoint, $44) A couple of curious patters in this here list: two invisibles, one hare and one rabbit. WELLINGTON 1 In the Hollow of the Wave by Nina Mingya Powles (Auckland University Press, $25) The beautiful second collection of poetry by award-winning Powles is a glorious weaving of words about living between shorelines, the qualities of material and domestic life, and making art with them. Also wonderful to see poetry at the top of the charts ahead of National Poetry Day on August 22. 2 Holding the Heavy Stuff: Making Space for Critical Thoughts & Painful Emotions by Ben Sedley (Little Brown, $35) An illustrated guide to coping with worry, low mood and feeling stuck. 3 Welcome of Strangers: A History of Southern Māori by Atholl Anderson (Bridget Williams Books, $70) This is an updated edition of Anderson's 1998 book. Here's the publisher's blurb: 'Professor Anderson traces the origins of early Waitaha and Kāti Māmoe, and the later migrations, conflicts and settlements of the hapū who became Ngāi Tahu. Drawing on tribal knowledge, early written records and archaeological insights, he details the movements, encounters and exchanges that shaped these southern regions. He shows how people lived seasonally from the land and sea, supported by long-distance trade and a deep knowledge of place. These were the communities that the first Europeans in Niu Tīreni encountered, as whalers, sealers and missionaries made their way around the coast.' 4 The Unlikely Doctor by Dr Timoti Te Moke (Allen & Unwin, $38) 5 A Beautiful Family by Jennifer Trevelyan (Allen & Unwin, $37) 'A Beautiful Family is set on the Kāpiti Coast in the 1980s. We know this because Trevelyan is meticulous with her references to the time period: the child's prized possession is a Walkman through which she plays Split Enz; The Exorcist has aired on TV; there are Seventeen magazines with sealed sections; the child and her sister Vanessa get terrifically sunburned and only after getting blisters does their mother buy some SPF15. There is also casual racism at play in varying degrees of intensity. A Chinese family is talked about in grotesque terms; a Māori character is described as having 'skin the colour of burnt caramel'. It makes you grind your molars until you remember that this is the 80s and such clangers were horrifyingly commonplace.' Read more, right here. 6 A Different Kind of Power by Jacinda Ardern (Penguin, $60) Bumped from the charts in Auckland, still going strong in Wellington. 7 Underworld by Jared Savage (Harper Collins, $40) Savage's latest exploration of New Zealand's criminal underbelly. 8 Orbital by Samantha Harvey (Vintage, $26) Welcome back old friend! We can now start betting on the next Booker Prize winner as the 2025 longlist has been announced. 9 M ātauranga Māori by Hirini Moko Mead (Huia Publishers, $45) 'In Mātauranga Māori, Hirini Moko Mead explores the Māori knowledge system and explains what mātauranga Māori is. He looks at how the knowledge system operates, the branches of knowledge, and the way knowledge is recorded and given expression in te reo Māori and through daily activities and formal ceremonies. Mātuaranga Māori is a companion publication to Hirini Moko Mead's best-selling book Tikanga Māori.' 10 The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (Faber & Faber, $28) Another classic! Who can forget Plath's description of eating a shrimp cocktail? A brilliant, unsettling first and only novel. The Spinoff Books section is proudly brought to you by Unity Books and Creative New Zealand. Visit Unity Books online today.
