What happens when one person refuses to tolerate injustice and gives everything they have to see it right? Edric Baker was driven by the idea that healthcare should be available for every person, rich or poor. In wartime Vietnam, he performed complex surgery on a patient, only to see him return and die from dysentery, a disease of poverty. Baker refused to accept that healthcare would remain out of the reach of the poor, and devoted himself to living out an alternative. From New Zealand to Vietnam and finally to Bangladesh, this is a story of dogged persistence as, sustained by his Christian faith, Baker confronts the 'emergency of poverty' allied with the best people for the task: the poor themselves. Over three decades in Bangladesh, Baker became the nation's 'Doctor Brother' and pioneered diabetes treatment costing just a few cents per day.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 348

Dimensions: 140 x 214 mm

Publication Date: 12-05-2023

A New Zealander’s Holocaust Mystery. “Every day, I am in Auschwitz,” she would say. Even though she never had been. During the Holocaust, Lidi, as a teenager, flees from Hitler and the Nazis. Forced to leave behind everyone whom she loves, she eventually arrives in New Zealand as a Jewish refugee, with her mother. Alive in their new country, but labelled again, they immediately are called ‘enemy aliens’, monitored by the police, their letters censored, their lives and movements restricted. Five years later in 1945, a few months after the liberation of Auschwitz, Lidi burns the letter written to her that tells her what happened to those she loved most dearly. She hopes that in turning the letter to ashes, her survivor guilt and trauma would disappear too. But her efforts are in vain. “They - all those relations - just perished,” Lidi says over and over again. Nearly 70 years later, just before she dies at the age of 92, Lidi said she regrets burning the letter. Too late. “They” remain a mystery to Helene, Lidi’s daughter. As does their fate. For 50 years, she travels the world, searching for her grandparents and her “just perished” family. It was as if “they” all just disappeared in a puff of smoke. But she does find traces in the killing centres, ghettos and death marches across Poland, Czechoslovakia and Germany, discovering murder, suicides, theft, and tragic love affairs.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 562

Dimensions: 153 x 234 mm

Publication Date: 01-06-2023

"A year or so before I had been asked by a senior space scientist why 'someone as clever as me would want to be concerned with the lowest one percent of humanity”’… The answer to this question sums up Olive’s life’s work. From an early age she saw the plight of ‘them’,the people whose disabilities set them apart. They were bullied, victimized, patronised or just neglected. Many facilities for ‘them’ were buried in the far reaches of an institution. ‘The further from the front door you were, the less attention and care you received.’ So, she became determined to do something about it. Olive Webb started work at the old Sunnyside Hospital at the end of 1969. Conditions there were terrible. From that time until now she has worked with people who have intellectual disabilities and their support people in all the places where they have lived – with their families, in the large institutions and in community homes. But Olive is clear, ‘the journey is far from over’.Miserly funding and discriminatory provision of basic services and supports continue to dog the sector and ensures that people who are disabled by intellectual disability, and any additional conditions, are still only variously successful in what they do. From Behind Closed Doors chronicles Olive’s career with both anecdotal and evidence-based data. It traverses an important time in the history of disability in New Zealand and demonstrates that until governments and the health sector truly recognize the rights of all people, there will always be a ‘them’ class.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 170

Dimensions: 153 x 234 mm

Publication Date: 16-06-2023

In this highly valuable guide, Wellness Specialist and TEDx speaker Lauren Parsons provides the tools to promote personal wellbeing and cultivate a positive and energised workplace. Burnout, poor health, and mental distress are on the rise globally. People are suffering in the workplace. The talent shortage is making it increasingly important for workplaces to set themselves apart as desirable employers, to attract and retain great people. Not enough leaders understand the fundamental skills necessary to foster true wellbeing, and many organisations – often inadvertently – treat people as ‘assets’ or resources’ to be used rather than human beings to be nurtured, motivated and celebrated. Award-winning Wellbeing Specialist Lauren Parsons, believes regardless of a leadership title or not, anyone can make a difference and set an example for others to follow. “I’ve spent decades helping leaders and teams discover the incredible benefits that flow on from prioritising your health and happiness… We spend so much of our lives at work, it’s a critical part of the fabric of society.” “If you want to improve the organization, you have to improve yourself and the organization gets pulled up with you.” – Indra Nooyi Split into three parts, Thriving Leaders, Thriving Teams starts with valuable Live Well Principles on how to thrive personally – both in and out of work. Part Two contains facts, stats and stories on why workplace wellbeing is worth the time and effort; and the book finishes with a six-part model on how to cultivate a thriving team culture, comprised of leadership tools and tactics to help create an optimal work environment. Parsons comments, “I feel incredibly privileged to have helped hundreds of leaders and workplaces take a human-centred approach. I’ve seen them adopt my snack on exercise philosophy; embrace brave boundaries; create inspiring, connected meetings; build psychological safety, trust and belonging; start working in-sync; embed a culture of appreciation; boost energy and effectiveness, and many more things – transforming their workplace culture.” Packed with the latest research, inspiring stories and practical tools, including a downloadable resource pack, Thriving Leaders, Thriving Teams is for anyone – from aspiring leaders through to CEOs, who want to make a positive change.

Bind: paperback

Dimensions: 152 x 228 mm

Publication Date: 20-05-2023

A New Zealand-born Chinese accredited career, leadership, and executive coach shares her invaluable tools to help you unlock your personal and professional potential. “Trusting yourself is about learning to lead yourself... about caring for yourself... then you can quietly exude the kind of leadership, confidence and persona that others want to follow.” In Trust Yourself First: Cultivating Self-Awareness, Confidence & Resilience, seasoned executive coach Doris Sew Hoy shares her expertise, research, and original tools of the trade curated to help you unlock your personal and professional potential. This guidebook poses thought-provoking and incisive questions to ask yourself, interspersed with Doris’ own candid musings. The answers will not only build self-confidence and resilience, but will motivate you to: • Explore your roots • Embrace your vulnerabilities • Enhance your emotional vocabulary • Discover the magic of Clean Language • Develop healthy habits, and more Trust Yourself First implores you to reflect on who you are, where you’ve been, and where you want to go so that you will realize that a well-balanced, meaningful life is well within reach.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 200

Dimensions: 139 x 215 mm

Publication Date: 20-06-2023

Thirteen-year-old Evan Hanson is always the last in her family to know what's going on; at least, that's how it feels. When her brother gets drafted to Vietnam, her anti-war mother takes him to Canada, leaving Evan and her younger, special needs brother with their army-officer father—who, unwilling to shoulder the burden of caring for his kids, takes them to their grandmother's roadside cafe and home. At Eat and Get Gas, Evan encounters a cast of characters she both likes and fears and eventually learns a big family secret that changes how she feels about everyone and everything.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 254

Dimensions: 140 x 216 mm

Publication Date: 06-06-2023

Hannah is in a mental health unit, in shock and rendered speechless following the sudden death of her husband and baby son one rainy night – for which she feels unspeak-able guilt. She pays little attention to her institutional surroundings as events play and replay inside her head. There is no way out, no way back, and no future she can possibly imagine, just an endless, unbearable present. Huia is also there, a long-term resident who lives entirely in her own inner world, a woman who seems unable to communicate. Her mutterings, her sleeve-plucking, her foot-tapping? Well, that’s just Huia. But who is she? What is her story and why does she play on Hannah’s mind? No one else pays attention to Huia’s condition, but Hannah is drawn to the mystery of the older woman … Huia has something to teach Hannah, if only Hannah pays attention – and she does. Gradually drawn out of her own web of misery, Hannah learns to read Huia and decides to follow the tiny clues back to the source and discover the truth of Huia. In the process, she uncovers the strange bonds that unite them and finds it might, after all, be possible to save her own life – that families can and should heal. And Huia is her path to redemption. Two women, two literally unspeakable tragedies, two families, one powerful and unforgettable story. No one should ever be made to feel invisible. And you are never alone.

Bind: paperback

Publication Date: 10-07-2023

When a distinguished New Zealand businessman is murdered in London, Detective Inspector O’Rorke is once again called in by Scotland Yard to help find the killer. But O’Rorke is soon enmeshed in the secrets of the past involving the chaos of the Crimean War thirty-four years previously and the murderous activities of the young revolutionaries who called themselves the Society of the White Rose. The dramatic events of those days shaped the lives and determined the fates of all who survived and now, the Society of the White Rose, more powerful than ever, is led by two of O’Rorke’s most unforgiving and ruthless enemies. Bogdan Lynskey and Count Zoltan Bathory have returned to London not only to assassinate the Austrian General Carl-Heinz Lorenz but to finally destroy O’Rorke himself. As O’Rorke tries to focus on the task at hand, whispers from the past grow louder, the circles of intrigue continue to swirl and alliances splinter, leading him to distrust even those who seem to be his closest colleagues. With danger now threatening his very household, O’Rorke’s return to New Zealand takes on a new and unwelcome urgency.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 240

Dimensions: 152 x 229 mm

Publication Date: 06-09-2023

From author Jonathan Shingleton, who brought us Alpine Thunder, the renowned book on the KB class, Jonathan brings us a well-researched and interesting account of NZR’s rebuilt three-cylinder G class. In attempt to make something useful of the ill-fated Garratts, NZR used the chassis of the three Garratt articulated locomotives to build six conventional G class locomotives. In theory, these should have been very handy motive power for the South Island, but the engineering constrictions imposed by the loading gauge on the new design plus the inherent weaknesses transferred from the Garratt engine units to the rebuilt engines, all conspired to make them problematic and unreliable. Jonathan delves into the detail of how NZR attempted to correct the issues and improve the design, plus how the crews worked these unique three-cylinder engines. This is a fascinating read.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 142

Dimensions: 210 x 296 mm

Publication Date: 20-06-2023

Most children enjoy water. They drink it, wash in it, swim in it, play in it, but do they know water’s story - where water comes from, where it goes, and all the things it does along the way? “Nana’s Simple Science - Te Pūtaiao Ngāwari o Kui: Water - Wai” delves into the water cycle as it follows the Rāroa River on its journey from the hills to the sea. The natural process of water particles being converted from liquid, to solid, to gas in a never-ending cycle of evaporation condensation, precipitation, transpiration, percolation and collection. The Rāroa River flows down to the sea, bringing fresh water for you and for me. Ka rere te Awa o Rāroa ki te moana, ka hari i te wai māori mōu, mōku anō hoki. Heneriata Te Whata’s inspired illustrations bring the story to life in an authentic kiwi environment while Piripi Walker’s translation keeps the words simple and clear, so the rhythm is right, and each sentence flows when delivered aloud.

Pages: 28

Dimensions: 210 x 280 mm

Publication Date: 30-03-2023