Her name was Magda. Nobody will ever know who killed her. It wasn’t me. Here is her dead body…
So begins Death in Her Hands, the compelling new novel from Ottessa Moshfegh who is an expert at evoking the weird, eerie and mordantly funny. Kind of like Patricia Highsmith meets Ottessa Moshfegh meets Murder She Wrote, Death in Her Hands is a pageturner of a mystery - comic in places and pitch dark in others.
95bFM's Loose Reads: Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell /
On 95bFM’s Loose Reads, Kiran reviewed the eagerly anticipated new novel by David Mitchell Utopia Avenue. Set in 1967 right on the cusp of the Summer of Love, it follows the rise of a fictitious British psych/folk/rock/blues group called Utopia Avenue. The novel charts the group coming together, playing gigs, recording albums, falling apart, and sex, drugs and rock and roll scandals as well as the mundane vicissitudes of being in a rock group. Music lovers will have fun spotting the many cameos from famous musicians and bands as well as characters from previous Mitchell novels.
Bestsellers for July 2020 /
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95bFM's Loose Reads: Not That I'd Kiss a Girl by Lil O'Brien /
Today on 95bFM’s Loose Reads, Jenna reviewed Lil O’Brien’s Not That I’d Kiss a Girl. This astonishingly compelling memoir captures Lil’s experience of coming out in at the turn of the 21st century in Aotearoa. Funny, brutally honest and capturing the complexities of family relationships - this is an important story that’s well worth a read.
95bFM's Loose Reads: A Burning by Megha Majumdar /
Suri reviewed Megha Majumdar’s A Burning on this week’s Loose Reads. This book is a searing portrait of social mobility, class and racism in modern India. Told through the eyes of three central characters looking for fame and greatness, A Burning explores the Indian Dream with biting satire and political urgency.
A Burning was also our Lit Reads title for July! Listen to the review below:
95bFM's Loose Reads: Three South Korean Novels - Frances Cha, Elisa Shua Dusapin, Bae Suan /
Today, Jenna highlights some kick ass novels that are set in her old home of South Korea. With the rise of K-Pop, K-Beauty, films and of course, Han Kang’s The Vegetarian becoming popularised in the West, there’s no time like the present to delve into this spectacular pile of writing by Korean women.
If I had your Face by Frances Cha - a compelling, fast paced novel that follows a group of four women navigating urban society in Seoul.
Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin - Translated from French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins. A moody novel set in a tourist seaside town in the freezing winter. Atmospheric, sparse and
Untold Night and Day by Bae Suah - Translated from Korean by Deborah Smith. Jenna’s favourite of the pile. Filmic, sensory and surprising.
Listen to Jenna chat with Rachel and Mary Margaret below:
RNZ's Nine to Noon: Notes from an Apocalypse by Mark O'Connell /
On RNZ’s Nine to Noon, Kiran reviewed Notes from An Apocalypse by Mark O’Connell. This is a book about right now, to read right now! In search of preppers getting ready for the end of the world, O’Connell travelled to bunkers in South Dakota, to a conference in Los Angeles about the colonisation of Mars, to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, to wilderness reserves in the Scottish Highlands, and… New Zealand. The result is this throughly engaging reportage-cum-travelouge which is equal parts terrifying and hilarious. Reading Notes From An Apocalypse is like listening to your brainiest and funniest friend!
RNZ's Nine to Noon: The Mystery of Henri Pick by David Foenkinos /
In a small village in France, sits a library of unpublished manuscripts, which must be delivered in person.
A Parisian editor find a manuscript of genius while browsing the shelves. The book is published, taking the book world by storm - but is this a hoax? How can Henri Pick, a grouchy pizzeria owner, have written this when no one in his lifetime saw him pick up a pen?
A charming literary mystery with a kooky cast of characters, reminiscent of the film Amélie. Listen to Jenna’s review below and buy the book here.
95bFM's Loose Reads: Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor /
On 95bFM’s Loose Reads Kiran reviewed the incendiary novel Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor which is on the Booker International Prize shortlist. Set in a small Mexican village, this intoxicating novel has the feel of a Southern Gothic modern classic and looks at small town folklore and mythology, inequality, violence and superstition.
Bestsellers for June 2020 /
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TOP 5 BOOKS
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95bFM's Loose Reads: Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman /
In what’s been an incredibly strange and unsettling 2020, it can be good to read some non fiction with an optimistic outlook. Looking into well known psychological, economical and historical research within a new context, Bregman proves to us that humans are…really not that bad.
For fans of Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens. You can buy Humankind here.
Listen to Jenna. Rachel and Tess chat about this book on 95bFM’s Loose Reads below:
95bFM's Loose Reads: Nothing to See by Pip Adam /
Kiran was happy to be back in the 95bFM studio with Rachel and Sarah to talk about Pip Adam’s thrilling new novel Nothing to See. Kiran reckons Adam is one of the most interesting and exciting writers currently working in New Zealand fiction.
95bFM's Loose Reads: A Terrible Country by Keith Gessen /
One of the hardest requests booksellers get is for funny books! On 95bFM’s Loose Reads, Kiran reviewed A Terrible Country by Keith Gessen. It’s a hilarious novel about a failing academic named Andrei. He’s just split up with his girlfriend and moves from New York to Moscow to look after his ageing grandmother Seva, who is about to turn 90 and has accelerating dementia. This book is also packed with Russian history and politics and is super entertaining.
If you loved Olga Tokarczk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead you’ll love this!
95bFM's Loose Reads: Fake Baby by Amy McDaid /
We’re reunited in Level 1!
Jenna’s in the studio to chat to Rachel and Tess about the new New Zealand novel, Fake Baby by Amy McDaid. Set over nine days in Auckland city, this novel is full of wry, dry humour as we follow a three down and out, yet charming characters as they navigate society, family and their mental health.
Bestsellers for May 2020 /
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TOP 5 BOOKS
Bestsellers Gallery Archive (Pre 2022)
KID'S BOOKS
Kids' Bestsellers Archive (Pre 2022)
95bFM's Loose Reads: Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami /
Meiko Kawakami is a literary star in Japan (also a blogger, poet and former J-Pop star) and this is her first book published in English (translated by Sam Bet and David Boyd. )
Breasts and Eggs won Japan’s most prestigious writing award, the Akutagawa Prize, in 2007. Since then, it has expanded into two books within a book. In Book One, Natsuko is hosting her sister and niece over a sweltering summer in Tokyo from Osaka. Makiko is obsessed with getting breast implants while Midoriko is incredibly anxious about her impending body changes. In Book Two, it’s ten years later and Natsuko is exploring having a child using a sperm donor.
Throughout this novel, Natsuko is surrounded by solo, independent women and this book explores and makes a stand against Japanese patriarchal society. Grimy small apartments, bodily functions, ramen noodles and hostess bars are the background to an intriguing and fleshed out character study.
Also, highly recommended is Kawakami interviewing Murakami where she deeply takes him to task for his writing of female characters.
Listen to Jenna’s review with Rachel and Sarah below:
RNZ's Nine to Noon: Square Haunting by Francesca Wade /
A fascinating group biography of five women who lived on Melkenburgh Square between WW1 and WW2.
For fans of English literature, feminist leaders and the Bloomsbury set.
You can order the book here.
Listen to Jenna chat about Square Haunting as well as book store life in Level 2 below:
95bFM's Loose Reads: Underland: A Deep Time Journey by Robert Macfarlane /
How often do we think about and how much do we even know about the immense world that lurks beneath our feet? Robert Macfarlane is the poet of the natural world, the linguist of landscape. As we re-emerge from the “underland” of lockdown, his exquisite book Underland: A Deep Time Journey is the most thoughtful and beautiful book to gently dive into at this time. This exhilarating investigation into the world beneath the surface we walk upon, moves between catacombs, a laboratory underground in Yorkshire, and underground burial chambers for nuclear waste in Finland. Macfarlance explains that the underland archives the past, and tells us so much about the future… Kiran read this book in absolute wonder, and reviewed it on 95bFM’s Loose Reads.
AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Becky Manawatu /
Becky Manawatu’s Auē is shortlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at this year’s Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. You can listen to Kiran’s rave review on 95bFM Breakfast’s Loose Reads here. Manawatu spoke to Kiran ahead of The Ockham NZ Book Awards Winners’ Ceremony which will be live-streamed from 6pm May 12 on the Ockhams YouTube channel where you can now also view readings from the shortlisted authors.
How do you balance fiction writing with journalism? Do you have a preference and do the two different forms inform each other?
My experience as a reporter helped me with editing, and has improved my writing in general. Writing human interest stories, interviewing people gives me a unique, though I admit sometimes sanitised, insight into people's lives. I just love working with words.
Arundhati Roy says fiction is her first love and greatest love, and that is true for me too. Fiction means so much to me. It does not keep me or my family fed or clothed, however if I could immerse myself in it more often, either reading or writing, I really would.
Congratulations too for your nomination for the Best First-Person Essay or Feature at the Voyager Media Awards for your striking personal essay published by Newsroom. Is this area of writing something you’d like to pursue?
I do enjoy personal essay writing, but it is a tough one, while writing them I am obviously mining my own life and writing with the belief that someone might be interested in what I tell them - about myself, this feels like an immensely indulgent thing to do.
But it is not just out of an interest in myself, but an interest in the world and people. And I guess I am my own access to other people and the world and I like to write with that access kept intact. I also prefer reading essays where that connection is kept intact. If it's severed, ie, the writer removes themselves completely from what they are expressing, I have to work harder to hold my attention on it. It is probably important I try to do that more often, maybe.
However, I have thought about cutting down on the number of personal essays I write, as I really want to write another novel. To write a novel I need to have a bright, burning hunger to say something, to feel heard.
If I keep saying things and being heard, I'm afraid it'll keep the fire in my belly just smouldering away, contentedly, the hunger consistently satiated. But I think the personal essays around Auē were important ones for me to write, and I hope I can continue to write the odd first person essay.
Becky Manawatu’s lockdown bookstack
What was in your lockdown bookstack?
I read Bernadine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other. I re-read 'patches' of Renee's memoir These Two Hands, and re-read Janet Frames' Owls Do Cry. I read poems and prose in Sport 47 edited by Tayi Tibble. I listen to Zadie Smith on Youtube lots too, then read any of her essays I could find online. Every Saturday I read Newsroom's new short story.
What book is your comfort read/re-read and why?
Women who Run with the Wolves, by Clarissa Pinkola Estes. I like to reread parts of Witi Ihimaera's Tangi and parts of The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. Tangi and The God of Small Things are both books to pick up and flick to a page and reread because they are poetic, as is Frame's Owls Do Cry.
Women who Run with the Wolves is to me, mostly about creativity. It's deep and yum and honours storytelling and makes me want to write.
I have ordered myself a wee stack of books from my main book squeeze. Order includes Hemi Kelly's A Māori Phrase a Day and Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor and Ice Monster by David Walliams for my 11-year-old girl who loves reading too.
What was the last book that really moved you, and why?
Janet Frames' Owls Do Cry. I love the feeling that I am moving around in other human's minds, not being held out, allowed into the strange landscape that is the human psyche. Frame makes these allowances like few other writers can.
What are you working on next, Becky?
I've started writing about this character, a young girl. I have given her a single experience from my childhood to plant a kind of seed.The experience is when I was very young, probably six,I squashed a fly on a windowsill at my house I lived in Birchfield (West Coast). I had been so bored and in my boredom, simply killed this little fly. Small maggots writhed out of it and I was stunned by them. (Mistrusting this memory, because I believed flies laid eggs I googled it and found flies can lay eggs or have live maggots in their bellies).
Anyway, I recall sitting there watching the maggots and looking at the dead fly and feeling like I had done something enormously bad.
Probably months later - I can't be sure - I was watching a nature show on TV and it was about termites, and when I saw the termites I was consumed by guilt because I thought they might have been the things that came out of the fly's belly and on the TV the termites were turning wood to dust and I thought 'Oh no - the termites will be eating our house too and then it will fall down and we will all die and it will be all my fault.'
So I have given this character this story, this grain of worry, guilt, and I just want to see what happens, what the worry forces her to think, feel, do and how it shapes her. Also I just find it interesting how children perceive the world, and I think this personal experience is a good example. Who knows, it'll probably come to nothing...
More about the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards here
AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Owen Marshall /
Owen Marshall’s Pearly Gates is shortlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at this year’s Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. You can listen to Kiran’s review on 95bFM Breakfast’s Loose Reads here: Marshall spoke to Kiran ahead of The Ockham NZ Book Awards Winners’ Ceremony which will be live-streamed from 6pm May 12 on the Ockhams YouTube channel where you can now also view readings from the shortlisted authors.
Kia ora, Owen! Congratulations on being shortlisted for the Jan Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction! Pearly Gates is a charming novel set in a vividly evoked provincial South Island town. A sense of place and landscape is often a key element in your writing - how important is place and landscape to you?
Most of my writing is concerned with the investigation of character, and I like to give readers a sense of where my characters are, as well as who they are. Landscapes and cityscapes affect the people who live there, and the people in turn affect their settings. I enjoy the evocation of physical surroundings when I read and strive for that in my own work.
Pearly is a “good local son” who is accustomed to success in his life as a rugby player for Otago and a two term mayor. He is aware however, that the tide can turn. What were you interested in exploring there?
In regard to the themes of Pearly Gates - I wished to emphasise the complexity of personality even in apparently ordinary people, the moral ambiguities we all share. Pearly makes a bad decision and has to live with the consequences of that. Also I hoped to present a convincing portrait of provincial South Island life.
What book is your comfort read/re-read and what has been in your lockdown bookstack?
Despite the time provided by the present lockdown, I haven't been reading much over the last few weeks because we have recently moved to another home and chaos rules. I have been re-reading some of Alice Munro's fine stories from her collection Dear Life. As for a ‘comfort read,' I enjoy the Jane Austen novels and also the fiction of Irish writer William Trevor. In non-fiction, I find fascinating the works of neurologist Oliver Sacks. The novel that most moved and impressed me in recent years was Enduring Love by Ian McEwan.
What are you working on next, Owen?
After several novels, I have returned in my own writing to short stories, encouraged by a recent grant from Creative New Zealand. Short stories are not as commercially successful as novels, but have an especially honourable place in New Zealand literature and offer interesting challenges to both writer and reader.