Otto Bader, Pansy Williams and Clem Bright live in the small mining town of Blackball on the West Coast, shaped by stories and the dream of a better, more equal society to come. But the First World War erupts and Otto, being of German descent, is torn from his family and the love of his life, Pansy, to endure the war interned as an enemy alien on Somes Island in Wellington Harbour. His suffering with the other internees, the culture of brutality and abuse of power by those in charge, is both chilling and truthful, and all the more poignant by taking place within sight of the capital city. Both his present and his future appear to be stolen from him. Pansy, pregnant, marries good, kind Clem, who then betrays his socialist principles by enlisting. Love, loss and abandonment haunt both Otto and Pansy, with reverberations far into the future. Lena is their child. Spirited, clever and perceptive, she tells her own story of growing up in the close-knit Bright family and the changes that occur when Clem returns from the war damaged both physically and psychologically. Lena’s journey to adulthood is beautifully por-trayed as she observes the people who make up her family and develops into an educated and creative young woman. Blackball is where she belongs and it is the place she recalls when she paints her memories. By the Green of the Spring is the gripping story of lives changed forever by war, the hurts suffered, the losses borne, and the secrets kept, yet it is also the story of the capacity of the human spirit to endure, to hope and to love. https://www.book2look.com/book/YuAlsdWDXK

Bind: paperback

Pages: 272

Dimensions: 153 x 234 mm

Publication Date: 02-08-2022

Author and leadership specialist Brenda James teaches clients how to develop self-belief. But for decades she was stuck in self-doubt herself. Her book BELIEVE takes us on a guided journey of building leadership skills and self-confidence. As a leader, no matter where or when you start to experience a dent in your self-belief, once it is triggered and activated, your outlook changes. You see everything through blurred lenses, constantly looking for evidence that you are not quick enough, deserving enough or smart enough. And, of course, you will always find it. When leadership is new or the role gets hard, self-doubt can easily take over. Self-belief is the remedy. But how do you tangibly develop this? In her book ‘BELIEVE: How New Leaders Step Up and Into Their Full Potential’ Brenda takes us on a guided journey, showing how leaders can increase their self-belief and leadership confidence to create more cohesive teams, increase workplace wellbeing, and most importantly, find a deeper sense of internal wellbeing.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 177

Dimensions: 127 x 203 mm

Publication Date: 06-08-2022

In this new book published by the Museum of Transport and Technology Society, you will learn of the incredible saga and near failures that the Baldwin Steam Tram No100 endured on its travels from Philadelphia, USA to New Zealand via Australia. This certainly is a Wonderful Story of the tram's trial, tribulations and successes over 131 years. For some 40 years, the tram successfully served the communities of Sydney, Rockdale and Wanganui. After spending another 30 years either in storage or awaiting the scrappers torch, in 1958 it was purchased by two tramway volunteers who donated it to the Old Time Transport Preservation League (OTTPL). The OTTPL who arranged for the tram's storage in Auckland, was one of the forerunners of Auckland's Museum of Transport and Technology (MOTAT). Meticulous record keeping by people who have been involved in its life, particularly tramway historians and specialist museum restoration volunteers, has enabled this book to be written. It follows the tram's life in detail, from its construction in 1891, to the Western Springs Tramway, some 131 years later, where it now happily runs.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 80

Dimensions: 210 x 250 mm

Publication Date: 01-08-2022

Frank Herbert’s DUNE meets Ian McEwan’s MACHINES LIKE ME Once upon a time in the future, things are looking grim. Plague stalks the land, people live behind city walls, or underground, or huddle in remote ham-lets. No more animals, no more birdlife, no more freedom… never has the divide between rich and poor been so evident, never has the Earth been so despoiled, and never has the need for a hero been stronger. Enter Chevalier, an unassuming and mild-man-nered tax inspector by day but a secret law-breaker and risk-taker by night who decides to experiment with a new virtual reality headset – CIRCE. And before he knows it, our hero finds he can dip in and out of a world long ago and far away where his deepest hopes and fears are met, where there’s magic in the air, and where his spirit and bravery can emerge. Helped (and hindered) by a collection of heroes, heroines, gods, goddesses and raving beauties from ages both ancient and modern, our hero gradually takes on the spirit and bravery of the legendary Gawayn. Masks, disguise and identity are key to the journey, and Chevalier discovers he is not alone. A bold and cunning plan is called for… the evolution of Gawayn is essential. This is a fable for our times. Serious, whimsical, funny, powerful and sexy, Chevalier & Gawayn is a thrilling mix of adventure and adversity and the need to heed the past. It is also a warning of the dangers facing society, but most of all, it is a celebration of our power to face and overcome them.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 472

Dimensions: 153 x 234 mm

Publication Date: 30-07-2022

In 1969 Al Riordan, a US Exchange Scientist, joined Simon Cutfield and three other New Zealanders to spend a year at Vanda Station on the shores of Lake Vanda in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica. The men lived in a strange world – a snowless place that had not seen a glacier for millions of years, yet lay within sight of the permanent East Antarctic Ice Sheet. The surface of the lake was covered in 3–4 metres of permanent ice, but the temperature of the water near the bottom was +25°C. No one knew for certain why the water was so warm, and Simon’s mission was to take measurements to help solve this mystery and carry out a range of other hydrologic and earth science projects. Al’s aim was to help build a comprehensive weather record, understand the valley wind systems, and to learn why the area was snow-free. Drawing on their diaries and letters, this is a unique first-person account of life at the station as the five men carry out their daily tasks in an environment that challenges and transforms them: temperatures as low as –57°C, eight months of total isolation, including four months of continual darkness, and daunting mechanical and logistical challenges, including a limited supply of power, fuel, heat and water. At least it’s no challenge to follow the instructions on their photographic chemicals – ‘Keep in a cool place’ – like much of their supplies, this equipment is encased in ice. Supplemented with scientific appendices, the book also gives the reader a window on how scientific knowledge is built one step at a time, from the initial planning, to data gathering, to building hypotheses, and to developing theory. As the only complete record of life at Vanda Station during the first year of its occupation, and complemented by a selection of maps and colour photos, this engaging account is an important missing chapter in the history of New Zealand’s Antarctic achievements.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 296

Dimensions: 152 x 229 mm

Publication Date: 01-09-2022

A novel of father figures, bullshit and belonging. As Vladimir Nabokov expert Professor Brian Bode writes in his foreword to Godfrey Cheathem’s last letter: “... I was able to play a prominent role in bringing his remarkable novel Chasing the Fading Light to worldwide attention. As was shown in my biography of Godfrey Cheathem (a New York Times #1 bestseller for 28 weeks), this was despite my doubts that a New Zealander — or, more particularly, this son of New Zealand — could have penned what is now recognised as not only a supreme Antipodean novel, but also as the novel that may yet prove to be one of the greatest of this new Oceanic century”. Traumatised by his failure to match the creative successes of his precocious younger siblings – early over-achievers in theatre, music and fine arts – Godfrey Cheathem never expects that his baffling experimental pottery will one day lead him to the unlikely heights of international book publishing. There he meets a mysterious artist, a pivotal encounter on a journey of self discovery that points up some of the many absurdities of New Zealand life and culture, and culminates in Godfrey’s comic yet anguished unravelling at a grand reunion at the Cheathem tūrangawaewae, the farm that has been in his wider family for generations. Godfrey Cheathem died not long after completing his last letter in his cell in Paparua prison, never living to see the publication of his great novel. Cheathem’s letter is written to his sister, and tries to explain the events that led to his imprisonment.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 324

Dimensions: 152 x 230 x 20 mm

Publication Date: 01-08-2022

A lot of international games have been played by New Zealand men’s and women’s national teams since the first New Zealand Tournament Team was selected in 1947, but all are covered in this official History of New Zealand Basketball. Also recorded are New Zealand junior selections, national representative results, and the New Zealand leagues from when they emerged. So is the involvement of American, Australian and European players and coaches New Zealand brought in both to widen the league player bases, and to assist broadening the international expertise of locals to ensure the Tall Blacks and Tall Ferns could compete well in World Championship and Olympic events. The book also identifies many New Zealanders who have played some of their basketball in national leagues of other countries. And it traces the basketball politics across the years. Game detail is here—’stats’, as this material is now called. But the real story is about New Zealand basketball people—players, coaches, and administrators. And the very wide selection of photographs reminds the basketball world how many local identities looked in their prime. Twelve of the key ones grace the cover—who can you identify? But there are hundreds more, as the History of New Zealand Basketball covers 75 years.

Pages: 568

Dimensions: 205 x 275 mm

Publication Date: 31-05-2022

Past and present become dangerously entwined in this intricate and compelling psychological thriller from author and film-maker Richard Woolley. It is 2015, and successful Kiwi journalist Joy Manville enjoys a fulfilling life in New Zealand, Aotearoa, together with her older English husband, Stephen, a Professor in Film Studies at the University of Auckland. Almost an idyll, until their peaceful path through life is crossed by a dark shadow from Stephen’s past. A persistent online shadow that leads Joy to question Stephen’s integrity and forces her into a disturbing and deadly investigation – first in New Zealand and then at Stephen’s childhood home and school in England. A dark drama that pits the easy going egalitarianism of New Zealand against the privileged, often perverse background of an English upper-middle-class family.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 410

Dimensions: 127 x 203 mm

Publication Date: 04-07-2022

Conquering Cascade brings to light a little-known chapter in the history of West Coast coal mining. Cascade Creek, a rugged and precipitous gorge, harboured a seam of some of the best coal in New Zealand, its ‘black gold’ well known but its extraction delayed by forbidding access and tempestuous climate. The story of the Cascade Westport Coal Company and its workforce, the Cascade Westport Co-operative Coal Party, is one of courage and audacity that included building a wooden flume to carry the coal a steep 250 metres drop towards the coast. At over 12 kilometres long this flume was not only the longest such structure ever built in New Zealand, it also confounded the naysayers who said it couldn’t be done. Conquering Cascade chronicles the troubles, triumphs and trials of the Cascade Creek men and women as they toiled to make a living, their association finally ending in a catastrophe of nature and the mundanity of a court room. Following a decade of research, interviews and gathering rare material, Phil Walsh has documented an epic saga in New Zealand’s industrial coal mining heritage. Includes maps and 18 pages of colour and b/w photographs

Bind: paperback

Pages: 328

Dimensions: 170 x 240 mm

Publication Date: 20-07-2022

This luxe cotton fold out book series is designed for little hands and developing eyes to ex-plore. Made from 100% premium cotton and filled with plump natural & hypo-allergenic corn fibre, each book features bold high-con-trast designs that attract and engage infants in early learning and development. Packaged in a signature eye-catching modern card band, these books are beautiful for display and perfect for gifting. Designed in NZ.

Dimensions: 130 x 130 mm

Publication Date: 01-05-2022