Eleanor Catton’s second novel, The Luminaries, opens with the arrival of Scotsman Walter Moody in Hokitika on the west coast of New Zealand’s South Island during the gold rush of 1866. A group of twelve men, the eponymous luminaries, are meeting to unravel a complex story involving stolen gold, a vanished man, a dead recluse, Read More
If you feel like watching Kick Ass 2, make sure you don’t do it for the dialogue. Like the first Kick Ass film directed by Matthew Vaughan, this sequel is ultra-violent and extremely fast paced; however, unlike its predecessor, this movie induces incredulity rather than providing the shock factor which had made the first film Read More
With its placid sea and big sky, the grey and black of the cover of Eunice Buchanan’s book, As Far As I Can See, is both stark and calming. And this is as it should be, for the colour and energy are contained within; contained, yes, but bursting with the life with which Buchanan imbues Read More
Why write poetry? For the weird unemployment. For the painless headaches, that must be tapped to strike down your writing arm at the accumulated moment. (“The Instrument”) This suitably plump volume of Les Murray’s poetry, spanning five decades, came wrapped in both delight and concern. The delight is self-evident. The concern … how would I Read More
Silence is an intriguing film placed somewhere between documentary and fiction. The debut feature of filmmaker Pat Collins can most accurately be described as film art and may, therefore, not be to everyone’s taste. Collins has opted to create a calm, meditative film that coolly unfolds as its protagonist and audience are forced to reflect Read More
Collaborative film direction can be a tricky proposition, which often results in a disjointed final product – a movie which appears to be the sum of two distinct parts rather than a coherent whole. However, when done expertly, such an approach can be beneficial to the final result; as the saying goes “Two heads are Read More
The debut novel by Australian writer Christopher Currie, The Ottoman Motel is a mystery centred around eleven year old Simon Sawyers. The plot follows Simon and his parents as they reach the small town of Reception on a family holiday caused ostensibly by a sudden need to visit Simon’s estranged grandmother. However, after falling asleep Read More
Simon Mundy’s fourth poetry collection, More for Helen of Troy, is, in many ways, a mixed bag. It ranges from vignettes of Helen of Troy in the opening ten-poem sequence to poems of landscape, personal incident and ideas. And it explores themes as varied as gender relations, war, ageing and ideals. Mundy brings a deftness Read More
The celebrated New York poet Jorie Graham has published numerous collections of verse, including Hybrids of Plants and of Ghosts, Erosion, The End of Beauty, Region of Unlikeness, Materialism, The Errancy, Swarm, and Never. Her first edition of selected poems, The Dream of the Unified Field, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1996. A sequel to Read More
It’s not often that you hear an original new voice in writing, but Dickson Telfer’s debut collection of short stories seems to signal him as owning just such a voice. The stories have impressive imaginative power, depicting kaleidoscopic worlds seen from skewed angles through highly coloured prisms. There is great variation in his narrative style Read More