Interview: Kate Preece on Ten Nosey Weka
Carly Thomas talks with Ten Nosey Weka author Kate Preece about creating a picture book that’s part of the ta rē Moriori revival. A new children’s picture book by Kate Preece sits on the bookshop shelf alongside others. Its beautiful…
Review: Three picture books with messages for their readers
Annelies Judson reviews three recent picture books designed to soothe and inspire young readers. The Lucky Little Pig, by Stacey Smith, illustrated by Deborah Hinde The Lucky Little Pig is another in an unofficial series of “Aotearoa Natural Disaster Animal…
The Giselle Clarkson Comic: Number 43
Forward this link to your boss instead of a doctor’s certificate – the Giselle Clarkson comic is full of good reasons to skip work today.
Interview: Stacy Gregg on Nine Girls
2024 judge of the NZCYA awards Belinda Whyte in conversation with Margaret Mahy Award winner Stacy Gregg. I’ll be honest with you, I had never read a Stacy Gregg novel before reading Nine Girls for the judging of the 2024…
Review: Three adventurous new graphic novels
Three new graphic novels that explore ideas of friendship and adventure. Duffy is determined to help a new friend who is being bullied, Miles and Jones need to save themselves, their parents and their park and Detective Beans is on…
Regular Features
Features
A selection of poems for National Poetry Day
Paula Green shares eight poems for children from Roar Squeak Purr: A Treasury of New Zealand Animal Poems. In 2013, I launched Poetry Box, an online poetry page for children in Aotearoa. I wanted to create a meeting place for...
Books Alive: a scene report from Books Alive 2024
Annelies Judson explores the Wellington edition of Books Alive, the schools programme that accompanies the NZCYA awards. It’s a beautiful morning in the capital and lines of children, like wriggling eels, are making their way into the National Library. Once...
The Winners of the 2024 NZCYA awards are…
Fresh off the ceremony at Pipitea Marae, Wellington, the winners of the 2024 NZ Book Awards for Children and Young Adults are… The Margaret Mahy Book of the Year and the Junior Fiction Award: Nine Girls by Stacy Gregg (Ngāti...
The Reckoning: Inviting an Author or Illustrator to Speak? What you need to know
There is something very special about having your favourite book creator come and talk at your school, or meeting a new author or illustrator who shares their stories and makes you laugh. They are definitely favourites at schools and libraries,...
The Sampling: 17 Kings and 42 Elephants
Illustrated by Alba Gil Cedrán This month’s Sampling is from last year’s winner of the Margaret Mahy Illustration Prize, Alba Gil Cedrán, in a re-imagining of Mahy’s 17 Kings and 42 Elephants. The shortlist for this year’s award will be...
Quiz: All Things NZCYA
In honour of the shortlist announcement for this year’s NZCYA Awards, this quiz is about all things NZCYA related! How much do you know about the Awards of past and present? Check out our coverage of the award finalists here....
From the Shop Floor: Mr Feather’s Den
Susan Ryan from a second-hand store of books and oddities in Featherston tells about their collection, challenges, and the value of a special find. Mr Feather’s Den started trading in December 2012, on State Highway 2 in Featherston. From the...
The Reckoning: Flagging Rainbow Storytime
Last month drag performers Coco and Erika Flash took Brian Tamaki to court over his protests and public comments against rainbow storytimes which caused them to cancel their storytime tours. Education researcher Kate Morgan writes about the importance of children...
NZCYA 2024 Wright Family Foundation Esther Glen Award For Junior Fiction Finalists
When reading our Junior Fiction finalists, Sarah Forster was blown away as always by the brilliance of Aotearoa’s authors that write for this audience. She asked each of the five authors to answer five probing questions, including a well-disguised version...
2024 PANZ Book Design Award Finalists: Children’s Books
It’s time to celebrate an oft overlooked aspect of book creation—the design. The Publishers Association of New Zealand has just announced the shortlist for Aotearoa’s best-designed books in nine categories. Here we are showcasing the three which focus on books...
The Mahy Questionnaire: Mandy Hager
You know it, you love it—it’s the Mahy Questionnaire! This month we are featuring former educator turned multi award-winning author Mandy Hager! She tells us all about recurring newborn nightmares, sweet-talking cars and desiccated skinks, among other things. Her latest...
2024 NZCYA Best First Book Finalists
We’ve prepared something special this year to honour the Best First Book Finalists. Michael Park School librarian Kura Rutherford corralled her student librarians into considering the shortlist and awarding their own medals for merits they deemed worthy. See the list...
2024 NZCYA Te Kura Pounamu Award Finalists
For the Te Kura Pounamu finalists we asked the publishers why it was important to them to publish these particular books in te reo Māori, and our te reo editor Faith Tupou makes some comments as well. Read our comments...
2024 NZCYA Elsie Locke Award for Non-Fiction Finalists
The Non-Fiction shortlist is absolutely top class. We asked the finalists to pose a couple of questions to each other about their books. Read our comments about the books in all the categories here. Selina Tusitala Marsh asks Gavin Bishop…...
From the Shop Floor: Page & Blackmore
Page & Blackmore bookstore is a beloved Nelson icon and has been going strong for over 25 years. In this month’s From the Shop Floor, shop owner Jo tells us about Page & Blackmore’s history, their highlights and challenges, and...
Interviews
Interview: Kate Preece on Ten Nosey Weka
Carly Thomas talks with Ten Nosey Weka author Kate Preece about creating a picture book that’s part of the ta rē Moriori revival. A new children’s picture book by Kate Preece sits on the bookshop shelf alongside others. Its beautiful...
Interview: Stacy Gregg on Nine Girls
2024 judge of the NZCYA awards Belinda Whyte in conversation with Margaret Mahy Award winner Stacy Gregg. I’ll be honest with you, I had never read a Stacy Gregg novel before reading Nine Girls for the judging of the 2024...
Interview: Maia Bennett on judging the 2024 NZCYA awards
Convenor of the 2024 NZCYA Book Awards Maia Bennett takes The Sapling behind the scenes on selecting the cream of this year’s crop of books for children and young adults. On Wednesday evening the winners of the children’s and young...
For fox’s sake: An Interview With Juliette MacIver
Effervescent wordsmith Juliette MacIver has just released her new picture book, Little Axel’s Axolotl, a whimsical story about a very loved axolotl that dreams of adventure. In classic MacIver style, it is full of brilliant soundplay and interesting vocabulary, and...
Interview: Claire Mabey on The Raven’s Eye Runaways
Claire Mabey is one of the busiest people in Aotearoa literature: founder of the Verb festival, books editor at The Spinoff, and now novelist, with an outstanding debut, The Raven’s Eye Runaways. Thalia Kehoe Rowden had a thousand questions for...
Interview: Jane Arthur on Brown Bird
The intimidatingly-talented author of two acclaimed poetry collections, owner of the best fringe in New Zealand lit, and all round book-ish Good Sort sat down with Rachael King to talk about making the leap from poetry to kidlit and the...
Interview: Bringing the shadow of Tūmatauenga into the light
Following yesterday’s review of Te Ata o Tū | The Shadow of Tūmatauenga (Te Papa Press), Frank Wilson had several conversations with three of its writers—all Te Papa curators—about the creation of the book and how they hope it will...
Pasifika Book Hub: Connecting to tagata o le moana stories
More and more creators are turning to independent publishing to get their stories out into the world. Owner of Mila’s Books Dahlia Malaeulu tells us about the new Pasifika Book Hub which aims to support tagata o le moana in...
Q&A: Pukapuka Adventures at Auckland Writers Festival
The 2024 Auckland Writers Festival is coming up in a week with events taking place from 14 – 19 May. We asked the children’s events programmer Gabrielle Vincent about what’s going on for kids at the festival, and especially about...
Interview: Steph Matuku and Zak Ātea
Author Steph Matuku and illustrator Zak Ātea of The Dream Factory and Te Wheketere Moemoeā interview each other about their inspiration, careers, and dreams for the future. Zak: What is your most treasured book you used to read as a...
Interview: Gavin Bishop on Patu
With his latest book, Gavin Bishop (Tainui, Ngāti Awa) delivers a powerful tale of the New Zealand Wars and the painful history of colonisation in Aotearoa. Simie Simpson (Te Ati Awa) talks with Gavin about Patu and how it came...
Not An Interview with Linda Jane Keegan
A childhood friend of The Sapling’s lead editor takes it upon herself to fabricate an interview which is either embarrassingly or honourably accurate: you decide. I meet Linda Jane Keegan at her home in Tākaka. Or at least I would...
Burning Bright: An Interview with SF Said
SF Said’s visionary tale Tyger finally makes its way to Aotearoa bookshops this month. Already published to lavish acclaim in the United Kingdom, the book takes the mythic work of the great William Blake as inspiration for a middle grade...
Interview: Giselle Clarkson, Arts Laureate
This month, the children’s book community of Aotearoa New Zealand – and anyone who’s every interacted with her, probably – was collectively delighted to learn that illustrator Giselle Clarkson is one of the 2023 Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi Laureates....
Interview: Catherine Robertson
Catherine Robertson is a prolific writer of well-loved novels for adults, as well as being the co-owner of Wellington bookshop GOOD BOOKS. This year, Cyclone Gabrielle prompted her to write her first book for children, Pearl in a Whirl, brilliantly...
Reviews
Review: Three picture books with messages for their readers
Annelies Judson reviews three recent picture books designed to soothe and inspire young readers. The Lucky Little Pig, by Stacey Smith, illustrated by Deborah Hinde The Lucky Little Pig is another in an unofficial series of “Aotearoa Natural Disaster Animal...
Review: Three adventurous new graphic novels
Three new graphic novels that explore ideas of friendship and adventure. Duffy is determined to help a new friend who is being bullied, Miles and Jones need to save themselves, their parents and their park and Detective Beans is on...
Reviews: Bumper Batch of Nature Books
We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: children’s publishing on Aotearoa’s natural world is flourishing. Linda Jane Keegan reviews a stack of the latest in wildlife books, including a healthy dose of bird books. She also highlights a...
Reviews: Two Middle-Grade Historic Narratives
Joanna Grochowicz adds another Antarctic exploration journey under her belt and Pauline Cartwright’s re-released story of the Otago goldfields is back with a fresh face. Denika Mead reviews. Mawson in Antarctica: To the Ends of the Earth, by Joanna Grochowicz...
Review: New YA from Mandy Hager—Gracehopper
Mandy Hager’s latest young adult novel is a family drama bringing together issues of care work, disability, and identity. Elizabeth Heritage reviews. Gracehopper is Mandy Hager’s new YA novel about Grace Murphy, a Taiwanese 18-year-old living in Wellington with her...
Reviews: Pasifika Picture Books
Mele Tonga-Grant reviews three fantastic Pacific themed titles. They are a love letter to our future, Matariki in a Sāmoan context, and a celebration of our differences. Gagana Sāmoa is sprinkled throughout two of the books and the third is...
Review: Aotearoa YA that rivals The Hunger Games
Steph Matuku’s latest YA novel grapples with themes of enforced migration, loss, societal expectations, and coloniser violence. Ceridwyn Roberts describes it as ‘unputdownable’, a match for The Hunger Games, and better than other series. I always hesitate to call a...
Reviews: Five Fresh Picture Books
Tia Haira reviews a varied selection of picture books, covering te ao Māori, an auto-driver in Chennai, manatee antics, experiencing eczema, and the joy of being yourself. Because I’m Māori | He Māori Ahau, by Nicolla Hemi-Morehouse, illustrated by Story...
Reviews: Two New Junior Fiction Titles
Leila Austin joins two cousins with magical powers and their nana on their latest adventures dealing with floods, giant crabs and a furious fire goddess. Pipi and Pou and the Waves of Destruction (Pipi and Pou #5) and Pipi and...
Reviews: Four Picture Books
School librarian Zac McCallum reads and reviews four recent Scholastic picture books. There’s something here for fans of vehicles, cats, dogs, and sleeping (it’s possible the fans of sleeping might be adults). As a school librarian at a full primary...
Reviews: New Matariki Books
Ariana Stewart reviews four Matariki pukapuka (see her reviews also in te reo Māori) and Linda Jane Keegan reviews two more. Ko Ngā Whetū Kai o Matariki: Tupuānuku rāua Ko Tupuārangi (The Kai Stars of Matariki: Tupuānuku and Tupuārangi), written...
Ngā Arotakenga: Pukapuka Matariki
Whā arotakenga o ngā pukapuka Matariki, nā Ariana Stewart. These reviews will be available in reo Pākekā/English here. Ko Ngā Whetū Kai o Matariki: Tupuānuku rāua Ko Tupuārangi, nā Miriama Kamo rāua ko Zak Waipara, nā Ariana Stevens ngā kōrerō...
Reviews: Three reo Māori pukapuka
These are reviews of new picture books, by Lady Kataraina Pōkai. What do we think? You must read these books! Read these reviews in te reo Māori here. The Dream Factory, Rere Atu Taku Poi! | Let My Poi Fly!,...
Ngā Arotakenga: Toru reo Māori pukapuka
He arotakenga pukapuka ēnei, mō ngā pukapuka pikitia hou, nā Lady Kataraina Pōkai. He aha ō mātou whakaaro? Me pānui koutou i ēnei pukapuka! These reviews are available in reo Pākehā/English here. The Dream Factory, Rere Atu Taku Poi! |...
Review: Te Ata o Tū |The Shadow of Tūmatauenga
Just like the Aotearoa Histories curriculum itself, the catalyst for Te Ata o Tū was the petition from several Otorohanga High School students to include the New Zealand Wars as a compulsory topic in schools. Curators from Te Papa Tongarewa...
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