Karl's Reading List

Published by Random House New Zealand: Auckland, NZ, 2002. I'm starting to get a taste for non-fiction Alphabet Soup books; who knows what I'll pick for Z! With a little extra time on my hands while Elise and I recover from Covid, I've been able to get through this 10 person biography about prominent New Zealanders - or at very least, people with some connection to New Zealand. I say prominent, but there were a few individuals covered in this work that I had never heard of, and that is coming from a New Zealander with an interest in history. Not a full-on passion I guess. I mean, if I was full-on passionate about history I'm sure I would have heard of these people before, right? What makes this different from a regular biography is that the majority of the chapters were originally written as New Zealand Geographic articles. This results in an unusual feel; each chapter tells us the story of the individual in question (or at least part of it) while also describing the...

Published by Huia Publishers: Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand, 2018. Riki is the great-great-grandson of his namesake, Te Ariki, a soldier who fought in the First World War with the Maori Contingent. Riki lives in Wellington with his mother, who is obsessed with the story of Te Ariki, and has been listening to cassette recordings of interviews that Te Ariki's grandson Alamein made with Te Ariki in the 1970s. When Riki is unexpectedly hit by a bus while taking Te Ariki's diary to his mother, he wakes up in 1915 in Egypt, where he becomes mistaken for his ancestor. Now Riki must figure out why he is here, what happened to Te Ariki, and how - if at all - he can get home to the present. This is a great set-up for a story that examines racism, history, what defines a Maori, free will vs destiny, and the different ways in which New Zealanders can view their history. Hereaka has created an authentically 21st century voice with Riki, and is able to use her protagonist to analysis both...

Published by Penguin Books: North Shore, NZ, 2004. This book tells the story of three Maori brothers, Pita, Rangi and Tu, who one by one join the Maori battalion and end up fighting in Egypt and Italy during World War 2. Tu, our narrator, is the youngest of the three, and the vast majority of the book is presented as his journal entries from the war, with an additional framing device being that he is handing these journal pages on to his niece and nephew in order for them to understand their father, Pita, more. While Tu's journal entries are obviously mostly focussed on his own experiences, other chapters are interspersed with the 'journal entries', telling Pita's story in a third-person narrative. It is a little confusing as to how these may or may not be being presented to Tu's nephew and niece, as if we are to take the narrative at face value all of these chapters should be Tu's journal, but obviously are not. However, putting that aside we get a good idea of...

Published by Librivox. Originally published 1918. Audiobook released 22-08-2008 by LibriVox. Narrated by Ralph Snelson. Over a few days of fluey-ness and needing a rest for my eyes, I rediscovered my Librivox app. Librivox is an audiobook app, but the twist is that all books are public domain ones, and are read by volunteer narrators, meaning that they are available free to the reader. It does mean that not all recordings are equal, but if you find the right narrator, it is a great way to listen to something that you wouldn't necessarily buy. Edgar Rice Burroughs is most well-known for writing the Tarzan books, as well as John Carter of Mars, but The Land That Time Forgot  is another that at least had name recognition attached to it. Really, Burroughs is a "pulp" writer, crafting entertaining and vaguely cinematic stories that flow fairly well, without being super deep in any way. Just what you need for recovering from a flu. Land That Time Forgot  takes place during Wor...

Published by Penguin Books: London, England, 2008 (1995). I did not enjoy this book.  By now I’m used to the idea that a lot of the Booker books will contain sordid elements, but Billy Prior, the protagonist of this work, turns my stomach with his sexual behaviour. Not only through its explicitness (which is at the higher end of the Booker books I’ve read) but through his attitude towards it: he sleeps with both men and women, but never does so with any sense of real emotional attachment. Rather, he is merely using his sexual partners – for sexual release, for revenge, for humiliation… It would be possible to give an argument for why Prior acts the way he does, both because of being a gay man in a dangerous era for gay men, and because of the horrors he has and is continuing to experience in the trenches of World War One. Yet understanding his behaviour doesn’t make reading about it any more pleasant, and any hint that his behaviour is connected to these elements is hidden, leavin...

Published by Hodder & Stoughton: Great Britain, 2007. (1916). This is a classic spy novel, written during World War 1, and involving the on-going conflict greatly within its plot. At the time it was written it was a best seller, and was even read by some of the historical figures of the time, such as the Tsar of Russia! Given the very specific period of its origin, Greenmantle feels quite unique. The war is still somewhat a lark, not yet tarred with the same heaviness it would come to be. Gentlemen spies are able to travel the battlefields without too much problem, and even when difficulties arise are able to get out of them fairly easily. The plot itself centres around a mysterious figure, a possible Islamic prophet, who may be seeking to draw the Muslim world into the conflict on the side of Germany. Our heroes must try to discover the truth of these rumours, and undermine anything that would align such a significant chunk of the world with their enemies. I recommend ...