1. (1) A Different Kind of Power: A Memoir by Jacinda Ardern (Penguin)
The former PM’s memoir, the first such account since Jim Bolger, tops the bestsellers for a fifth week.
Ardern’s book has generally found favour among reviewers, including Henry Cooke for the Listener. He thought it intimate and fluent, “compulsively readable, easily consumable in two or three sittings, and often very funny”, even if it barely explained her government’s policy decisions. “Ardernism was always more a sensibility than a full ideology. It was a way of looking at the world and reacting to it, not a theory of change.” Cooke says “there are some hints, near the end of the book, that perhaps she isn’t so certain quitting was the right idea … There is little attempt to engage with the arguments against the latter half of the Covid period, when MIQ’s usefulness looked shaky and vaccine mandates radicalised thousands of people.”
Tracy Watkins, editor of The Post and Sunday Star-Times, agreed the book let us into some of Ardern’s emotional highs and lows. “We also gain some fresh insight into her own personal mechanisms for coping with such momentous events as the terror attack, and Covid. But we don’t learn a lot more about what was going on behind closed doors within her government, which must, at times, have been under enormous strain.”
The Guardian considered it “an emotionally rich and candid read, [but] the downside of skipping the political detail is that it’s hard to get a sense of how exactly her astonishing early popularity ebbed away”.
Tim Stanley of the Telegraph was more acerbic, writing that “the practicalities of the job don’t interest her: this book hinges on how everything felt”. The natural disaster at Whakaari White Island and the Christchurch mosque killings “brought out Ardern’s best: authoritative and sensitive, she has a fine temperament”. But she subtly vilified her opponents, he says: “I am so kind that anyone who disagrees with me must be nasty; so reasonable that my critics must be nuts.”
2. (2) Leading Under Pressure by Ian Foster & Gregor Paul (HarperCollins)
Demonstrating the rule that rugby memoirs are a sure bet in the NZ books market, Ian Foster’s account of his time as All Blacks coach holds on firmly to second place in the bestsellers. I haven’t read the book, but I hope it goes into the – in my opinion – unedifying way he was replaced as coach. Only super-retrospective refereeing stopped his team of All Blacks winning the RWC.
From the publisher: “Appointed as head coach 2019, Ian Foster led the All Blacks through one of the most tumultuous periods of the team’s 120-year history. Leading Under Pressure is a fascinating look into the pressure cooker inner-sanctum of the world’s most famous rugby team. With revelations about Foster’s time in the job, it also delves into the politics of rugby, and the events preceding the dramatic 2023 Rugby World Cup.”
3. (3) No, I Don’t Get Danger Money by Lisette Reymer (Allen & Unwin)
Waikato-born Reymer, after covering the Tokyo Olympics, found herself in the UK, where she became Newshub’s Europe Correspondent. She burst into tears when she got the job, which the Listener’s reviewer found instantly endearing.
“Her next three years were ‘London, August 2021 … Przemysl, Poland, March 2022 … Bucha, Ukraine, May 2022 … Kahramanmaras, Turkey, late April 2023 … Tel Aviv, late October 2023 …’ So it goes, with other locales in between, ending in Ethiopia, Lucerne, London again, and Barcelona, August 2024.“Her commitment to catastrophes starts with watching the Twin Towers fall on Mum and Dad’s TV. It’s the first of many, many narratives in a text that’s anecdotal rather than analytical. But then, stories are frequently the best way of getting to the guts of an issue, and Reymer tells hers with clarity and competence-plus.”
4. (5) Māori Millionaire by Te Kahukura Boynton (Penguin)
The publisher says the book “offers a beginner’s guide to healing your money mindset, building better habits for your money and life, and understanding how you can increase your income. Because no amount of budgeting can compensate for not earning enough.
“Discover how to:
— Introduce small, life-changing habits
— Master your mindset to align with prosperity
— Get out of debt
— See real returns by investing in yourself
— Protect yourself with insurance
— Overcome obstacles to achieve your goals
And so much more!
“The lessons in this book will teach you how to become 1% better every day — not only for you, but for your whānau too.”
5. (4) The Book of Guilt by Catherine Chidgey (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
Holding its own on the list is Catherine Chidgey’s much praised latest novel, which tells the mysterious, ominous story of three boys in an alternative 1970s Britain.
It’s a “tense, compelling, genre-fusing book”, said Emma Neale in the Listener. “There is the hint of submerged identity; of aspiration and prosperity, rubbing skins with disappointment and neglect; a preoccupation with what is authentic and what is fraudulent; the self and truth only dimly visible … Calling on the deeply rooted psychological power of the storytelling rule of three, the novel is divided into The Book of Dreams, The Book of Knowledge and The Book of Guilt. Three women, Mother Morning, Mother Afternoon and Mother Night, care for a set of thirteen-year-old triplets in an all-boy’s orphanage. There are three main narrative perspectives: Vincent, one of the triplets; the Minister of Loneliness, a government minister in charge of national care institutions known as the Sycamore Homes; and Nancy, a young girl kept in seclusion by fastidious older parents. This attention to pattern also coolly embodies the quest for order and control, the troubling obsession at the core of the fictional investigation.”
You can read Michele Hewitson’s interview with Catherine Chidgey here.
6. (6) Dr Libby Fix Iron First by Dr Libby (Little Green Frog)
“The one thing that changes everything,” reckons the subtitle of the latest book from Libby Weaver.
Iron is essential for our health, and its lack is particularly common among girls and women. Menstruation, pregnancy and hormonal change can lead to iron deficiency, iron absorption can be an issue for some people, and it’s often a trial to eat enough iron-rich foods.
Weaver’s new book Fix Iron First aims to address this. As her website, which also sells iron supplements made from organic peas, notes that low iron doesn’t just make you tired. “It can alter your brain chemistry, slow your metabolism, impact your thyroid, disturb your sleep and lower your emotional resilience. It affects how you think, how you feel, how you show up in the world – every single day.”
7. (NEW) Moto Mike the Motorbike (Nee Naw and Friends) by Deano Yipadee & Bruce Potter (Scholastic)
School holidays have ensured the rise of the latest from Mosgiel’s finest children’s troubadour, Dean O’Brien, aka Deano Yipadee.
From the publisher: “Singer-songwriter Dean O’Brien has produced yet another toe-tapping, singalong song, this time about Nee Naw’s friend, Moto Mike the Motorbike. Farmer Tom and his tractor are leading the annual pumpkin parade. When the tractor wheel jolts off the edge of the bridge, Tom finds himself in a precarious situation. Enter Nee Naw’s mate, Moto Mike, who swiftly takes action and saves the day.”
8. (NEW) Ellie Copter (Nee Naw and Friends) by Deano Yipadee & Paul Beavis (Scholastic)
And yet another from Dean O’Brien. This time: “There’s a fire in a field where two goats, Plinky and Plonky, are trapped. Nee Naw is on the way, but when a bridge collapses and Nee Naw can’t drive any further, Ellie Copter whirs into action and saves the day.”
9. (NEW) Mātauranga Māori by Hirini Moko Mead (Huia Publishers)
A companion publication to anthropologist and historian Hirini Moko Mead’s best-selling book Tikanga Māori.
From the publisher: “In Mātauranga Māori, Hirini Moko Mead explores the Māori knowledge system and explains what mātauranga Māori is. He looks at how the knowledge system operates, the branches of knowledge, and the way knowledge is recorded and given expression in te reo Māori and through daily activities and formal ceremonies. Mātauranga Māori is integrated into every activity people engage in. It touches the lives of people in whatever they do, in the way they act, in the way they think, in the way they learn and in the way their knowledge is shared with others.”
10. (4) Whānau by Donovan Farnham & Rehua Wilson (Moa Press)
This illustrated pocket hardback, ideal as a gift, aims to improve your te reo Māori one special phrase at a time. Donovan Te Ahunui Farnham and Rehua Wilson offer up dozens of expressions, often with metaphorical or proverbial origins, such as “He toka tū moana” (stalwart) and “Kei mate wheke” (never surrender).
Source: NielsenIQ BookScan – week ending July 12.
