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2023 NZCYA Elsie Locke Award For Nonfiction Finalists

It’s no secret that we love getting to learn and share publisher insight, so much so that we dedicate a NZCYA Awards finalist category every year to it! This year it’s the Elsie Locke Nonfiction finalists so without further ado,…

The Reckoning: Deaf Culture and our Stories

A lithe superhero with infinite power in the hands slides beneath to the underworld, guided by the hypnotising eyes of a Pīwakawaka. A tuatara locks it in a death grip, but she manages to break free by finger-spelling the magic…

The Finalists of the 2023 NZ Kids’ Book Awards Are…

Each year, the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults make for a massive occasion in the Aotearoa kids’ book world—move over Oscars, out of the way Silver Scrolls. This is our night. It’s my first year covering the NZCYA…

A Book Lover’s Dream: A Review of Featherston Booktown

Sapling editor Hannah Marshall tapped into her inner journalist to attend the Featherston Booktown festival earlier this month. Her findings are reported here (spoiler: she loved every minute of it). On any ordinary day, the small southern Wairarapa town of…

Reviews: Three Pasifika Books

Emmaline Pickering-Martin reviews three new Pasifika non-fiction books with important messages to share—from a student-written poetry collection to a wellbeing journal to a collection of personal narratives about autism, all told through a Pacific lens. Pasifika Navigators: Pasifika Student Poetry…

NZSL Week: Storytelling in sign

This week is NZSL or New Zealand Sign Language Week. Many of the books for young children featuring signed languages or Deaf characters or by Deaf authors – though much loved – do come to us from overseas. So to celebrate…