I’m not really a fan of short stories. I often find them lacking – I get to the end and feel dissatisfied that the story stops, with so much unsaid and so much more to be said. I had attributed this to my love of longer fiction and decided I just guiltily wanted more. But reading this debut collection from Emma Martin, I have discovered that great short fiction is in another league altogether. That’s is possible to connect with a character and still feel satisfied when they leave your conscious after only 20 pages.

This collection is about women, young and old, all at different stages of their lives, all with different challenges to conquer. The characters are recognisable in a way that many could be me; my friends; or my family. Or yours. I felt I knew them all by the end of the book. And although I cared enough about the fate of many, I did not crave more pages since these life segments were complete. Exquisitely complete.

Strong and interesting women of all ages populate this book – a woman who returns to NZ after an exciting OE and settles for a nice and good man; a 1960s teenager who finds herself whisked off to the city to await the imminent birth of her first child; a contemporary couple whose mildly dysfunctional relationship results in unpredictable disaster.

The events that unfold are simple everyday occurrences that many of us could find ourselves sin the midst of, but the observation of the fallout of these seemingly simple activities, events and decisions, is perfect. Emma Martin is an adept observer of the interesting titbits of which everyday life is comprised. It is perhaps not surprising that she won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize for the story from which the book takes its title.

I am already eager to read her next collection.

Published by Victoria University Press
ISBN 9780864738851


This review was first published on the booksellers.co.nz blog

It takes quite a lot of trust and faith in your reader to mix a thoroughly ancient legend, in this case about mythical selkies, with a modern of coming of age story. Half of the main characters in this book by Rachael King are in fact seals; seals that, in keeping with Scottish legend, turn into beautiful young women when they cast their skins aside to walk on land. The mythical selkies. The other characters are one half of a modern day separated family trying to get on with life as best they can. It also takes a good storyteller to pull it off.

Surprisingly perhaps, I found myself suspending disbelief; and I became entranced by this book and its characters. And it happened so subtly that I didn’t even notice. The main character Jake is a little lost – his parents are divorced, his mother remarried with a new baby. He visits his father who is living a nomadic writer’s existence on the Wellington coast. But the school holidays are never much fun without friends, so the adventurous Jake takes off to explore the rocks of the Wellington coastline. He makes friends with another equally lonely young girl and an old man and attracts the interest of some local bullies. But it is when he finds an abandoned seal skin which he hauls home that the trouble really begins. The taking of the skin is the key turning point in this book as it unravels the story and importantly prevents its rightful owner from going to back to the sea.

Hindsight is a great thing. And of course, I can tell you now that I knew all along which characters were human and which were seals, but what’s clever is the way this realisation subtly unfolds. There is not a moment of mass revelation, you just suddenly begin to understand who the characters are and how they inter-relate and it feels natural. I guess that’s why it easy to believe in all of the characters in this book; they just work.

Interestingly, I just handed the book to my eleven year old saying it was great and I think you will like it. He read the back (which mentions seal skins but nothing about selkies) and he asked “What’s up with selkies? This is the third book this year that’s had slekies in it.”

Really? I had no idea. Apparently, his teacher has been reading these books to them in class.

“What time period have they been set in?” I asked.
“Ancient of course” was his reply. “And all in Scotland.”
“What about one set in Wellington in modern times. Could that work?”
“Hmm, maybe.”

But there is no maybe about it. This book works and it’s a gripping page-turning tale.

The book should appeal to any reader (young or old) who is able to suspend reality briefly, but after all isn’t that what reading is all about?

Published by Random House
ISBN 9781869799144 (paperback)
ISBN 9781869799151 (e-book)


This review was first published on the booksellers.co.nz blog