Features

The winners of the 2019 Book Awards are …

Fresh off the ceremony at Te Papa Tongarewa, the results are in and your New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults winners are… The Margaret Mahy Book of the Year and the Picture Book Award The Bomb Written…

Book Awards: The Te Reo Māori Finalists

It’s the final instalment of our NZCYA finalist coverage for 2019! Our final category is the Wright Family Foundation Te Kura Pounamu Award for Te Reo Māori. When she’s not busy being a Sapling editor or a bookseller at Little…

Te Tiriti | The Treaty – The New Book

Following the release of the School Journal Story Library graphic novel Te Tiriti o Waitangi into schools a year ago, Lift Education have published a larger, bilingual version of the book. This is their first trade publication and unlike anything…

Te Tiriti O Waitangi – Te Pukapuka Hou

I muri mai i te tukunga o te pakimaero whakairoiro Te Tiriti o Waitangi nō te Puna Pūrākau o ngā Hautaka Kura i tētahi tau ki mua, ka whakaputaina e Lift Education he putanga rahi ake, putanga reorua o taua…

School Librarian of Aotearoa: Lydean Herman

Lydean Herman is a school librarian at Taita College in Lower Hutt. She has used the HELL reading challenge for the past few years to motivate her students to get books out of the school library, with great success. She…

Fraser Smith: Hooking Children Into Reading

Many of our country’s magnificent writers also have different day jobs, and chief among them are the teachers – or in this case, the principal. Fraser Smith, principal of Oturu School and author of Awatea’s Treasure (and forthcoming Awatea and…

Book List: Ethnic Representation in Picture Books

There are more ethnicities in New Zealand than countries in the world. So why is it so difficult to find New Zealand picture books that represent this diversity? Nida Fiazi searches out some exceptional New Zealand and international picture books…

The Mahy Questionnaire: Terry Fitzgibbon

You know it, you love it – it’s the Mahy Questionnaire! This month, we delve into the world of the author-illustrator with Terry Fitzgibbon. Terry illustrates his own stories and those of others, with his most recent picture book Coo-Coo…

My Childhood Books: essa may ranapiri

essa may ranapiri (Ngāti Raukawa) recalls the commitment of their nan in reading The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings aloud, the significance of Mauao to their early life, and the poetry of Grover. essa’s debut poetry collection, ransack, is…

THE SAMPLING: The Invincibles – Power Up!

The Invincibles: Power Up! is the first book in a super-charged new junior fiction series. Regular old rugby practice turns into something more when five kids are zapped by lightning and find themselves in possession of a range of different super powers!