WRITER AND illustrator MARTIN BAYNTON has had more than 30 children’s books published. His series, Jane and the Dragon, is a modern classic and has remained in print for 26 years—Weta Workshop has also made it into an animated TV series. Baynton writes for the stage, radio and TV and together with Richard Taylor, is the creator of animated children’s TV show “Te Wot Wots”, and is co-owner and executive producer at their entertainment company, Pukeko Pictures.
BERNARD BECKETT is an award-winning author of children’s and young adult fiction. His novels Malcolm and Juliet (2004) and Genesis (2007) both won Best in Young Adult Fiction at the New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. Te latter of which made publishing history when UK publisher Quercus Books offered the largest advance ever for a young adult novel from New Zealand. Following a Royal Society fellowship, Beckett’s growing interest in science led to the publication of Falling for Science: Asking the Big Questions, his first non-fiction book. Beckett’s most recent novel, August, follows the fate of Tristan and Grace as they suffer a serious car accident and are trapped upside down in their vehicle, hanging over the edge of a cliff.
JENNY BORNHOLDT is one of the leading New Zealand poets of her generation. She is the author of numerous books of poems, including Te Rocky Shore, which won the Montana New Zealand Book Award for Poetry in 2009. Her most recent is Te Hill of Wool (2011). She has held the Meridian Energy Katherine Mansfield Fellowship in Menton, France, was named an Arts Foundation of New Zealand Laureate in 2003 and in 2005 became New Zealand Poet Laureate.
New Zealand may be a long way away, but Felicity Wood takes a closer look at some NZ authors who have had international success
Bornholdt
HELEN BROWN’s tenth book Cleo, published in 2009, became an international bestseller and was translated into more than 16 languages. A movie is in development with South Pacific Pictures (makers of “Whale Rider”) and the sequel, Cats and Daughters, also became an instant bestseller upon its release in Australasia in March.
ELEANOR CATTON is the young star of New Zealand literature. Her début novel, Te Rehearsal, caused great excitement on publication—an
exhilarating and provocative novel about the reactions to an affair between a male teacher and a girl at his secondary school, as well as the more muted response to the death of another pupil. First published by Victoria University Press in 2008, Te Rehearsal went on to be published by Granta in the UK and Little, Brown in the US. It won the Montana New Zealand Book Award for best first book of fiction, was longlisted for the Orange Prize, and was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.
PAUL CLEAVE is an internationally bestselling author of six crime novels. Movie rights have been sold to his first book, Te Cleaner, which sold almost half a million copies in France and Germany alone and won the Saint-Maur book festival’s crime novel of the year. He has been shortlisted for the Ned Kelly Award, has won the Ngaio Marsh award for NZ crime fiction, and his sixth novel, Te Laughterhouse, is due for release in NZ and the US this year.
11 OCTOBER 2012 | THE BOOKSELLER DAILY AT FRANKFURT 19