NONFICTION
1 The Last Secret Agent by Pippa Latour & Jude Dobson (Allen & Unwin, $37.99)’
This is the hottest book in New Zealand, number one with a bullet in its first week, selling more than any overseas title, and demand is so huge that it’s already been reprinted. A free copy is up for grabs in this week’s book giveaway and it will be hotly contested, because everyone wants to read with their own eyes this amazing and inspiring story of a woman whose courage and daring is matched by her humility: Latour never spoke to family and friends about her incredible wartime exploits as a secret agent operating behind enemy lines in occupied France, until the truth slowly started to emerge. It led to her collaboration with Jude Dobson – the Jude Dobson! – to tell the full story. I started reading from a chapter of when she was recruited into British intelligence, and was hooked; when she talked about parachuting into France at night, I was terrified; when she talked about the constant fear on the ground, I was hooked and terrified: “We slept in forests, which were abundant in Normandy. It was the cusp of summer, so thankfully we were not often cold. At night we would travel to stay close to the German army — when they moved, we moved, and when the sun was up, so were we. Our lives were ruled by the rise and fall of the sun. And curfews…”
Amazing. To enter the draw to win a copy of the book which will surely stay at number one for weeks or maybe even months, share a story of wartime or military bravery, honour, or even sacrifice, and email it to stephen11@xtra.co.nz with the subject line in screaming caps I WANT TO READ THE LAST SECRET AGENT WITH MY OWN EYES. It might be a family story, a personal story, or a story you read or heard about and has stayed with you. Entries close at midnight on Sunday, May 5.
2 Foraging New Zealand by Peter Langlands (Penguin Random House, $50)
Fantastic guide to foraging for food in the urban and suburban wild; the author claims that his opportunism makes up something like 60 per cent of his diet.
3 Hine Toa by Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku (HarperCollins, $39.99)
This stunning new memoir is one of the three best books published this year, along with the essay collection The Beautiful Afternoon by Airini Beautrais, and Peter Walker’s book about the giant Haast’s eagle, Hard by the Cloud House, which ReadingRoom is devoting all week to covering next week. ReadingRoom recently devoted all week to covering Hine Toa, too; it included an extract from her memoir, recalling two violent incidents when being lesbian in Aotearoa put her life in danger and a review by Talia Marshall, who wrote, “Even as a grandmother she is sexy as fuck. I pored pover the glossy photographs that make up the middle of the book because back in the day she was hot stuff.”
A free copy was up for grabs in last week’s free book giveaway. Readers were simply asked why they wanted to read it. I liked this, from Jan, who emailed, “I need to read Hine Toa to shift from thinking to acting with bravery.”
But I was knocked out by this, from Denise, who emailed (no need to edit it with the contemporary practice of macrons; the point of her 164-word memoir is its setting), “My father and mother eloped in 1952 as they were pregnant with me. My Pakeha grandfather had called my Maori father a beast of the forest – not conducive to providing the support my mother needed at that time. My childhood was one of secrets kept and in my head wild imaginings. When I listened to Ngahuia speak on National Radio I cried because so much of what she said resonated with me and linked to my two sisters. We suffered growing up in fifties sixties NZ because of this background and none of us knew why. My sisters in their old age (and also myself as the older sister) are opening up to each other only now about the inherited hurts of that time and the impact on our adult years. I had already decided to buy this book as gifts for my sisters to support further healing and hey a free one for me would be lovely. Nga Mihi Nui.”
Kia ora to Denise; a free copy of Hine Toa is hers.
4 Evolving by Judy Bailey (HarperCollins, $39.99)
5 The Team that Hit the Rocks by Peter Jerram (David Bateman, $39.99)
6 Māori Made Easy Pocket Guide by Scotty Morrison (Penguin Random House, $24)
7 Dame Suzy D by Susan Devoy (Allen & Unwin, $37.99)
8 Aroha by Hinemoa Elder (Penguin Random House, $30)
9 Feijoa by Kate Evans (Hachette, $39.99)
10 Fungi of Aotearoa by Liv Sisson (Penguin Random House, $45)
FICTION
1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99)
Huzzah to Allen & Unwin for achieving the rare and blazingly successful feat of publishing the number one bestselling book of nonfiction and fiction in the same week. I think the last time this happened was in 2022, when Eddy, Eddy by Kate de Goldi topped the fiction chart, and cookbook Everyday Favourites by Vanya Insull topped the nonfiction chart; both were published by … Allen & Unwin. Quite simply they know the commercial book buying – that is to say, the book reading – market better than any other publisher in New Zealand. All authors who want to be successful and think they have a story or a subject of wide appeal should beat a path to their door at once.
2 Amma by Saraid de Silva (Hachette, $37.99)
3 The Call by Gavin Strawhan (Allen & Unwin, $36.99)
4 The Secrets of the Little Greek Taverna by Erin Palmisano (Hachette, $36.99)
5 The Space Between by Lauren Keenan (Penguin Random House, $37)
6 Kāwai by Monty Soutar (David Bateman, $39.99)
7 Sewing Moonlight by Kyle Mewburn (David Bateman, $39.99)
Otago is the star of this historical novel: “It’s winter of 1928, and young German man Wilhelm Erdinger is left stranded in the remote New Zealand village of Falter’s Mill. Wilhelm purchases a piece of land capable of providing the kind of sustainable, self-sufficient life he craves, and a shack he soon begins to call home. Though he is regarded with suspicion by many in the local community, he soon attracts a small number of friends, each outsiders in their own way. Wilhelm survives, at times even flourishes, in a country rocked by the effects of war and the Depression. However, it is the arrival of a new war – coupled with the sometimes-brutal climate of Central Otago – that threatens to destroy the utopia he has created.”
A new short story by the author will appear in ReadingRoom tomorrow. It’s excellent, and so is her novel.
8 Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton (Te Herenga Waka University Press, $38)
9 The Girl from London by Olivia Spooner (Hachette, $37.99)
10 The Axeman’s Carnival by Catherine Chidgey (Te Herenga Waka University Press, $35)
