Montana New Zealand Book Award winners

Congratulations to the winners announced tonight at a gala dinner ceremony at Auckland War Memorial Museum. The 10PM Question by Kate De Goldi (Longacre Press) won the Readers’ Choice Award.

Fiction and winner of Montana Medal for Fiction or Poetry: Novel About My Wife by Emily Perkins (Allen & Unwin)

Runners up:
The 10PM Question by Kate De Goldi (Longacre Press)
Acid Song by Bernard Beckett (Longacre Press)

Poetry: The Rocky Shore by Jenny Bornholdt (Victoria University Press)

Biography and winner of Montana Medal for Non-Fiction: Rita Angus: An Artist’s Life by Jill Trevelyan (Te Papa Press)

Environment: A Continent on the Move: New Zealand Geoscience into the 21st Century edited by Ian Graham (Geological Society of New Zealand)

History: Buying the Land, Selling the Land by Richard Boast (Victoria University Press)

Illustrative: Len Castle: Making the Molecules Dance by Len Castle (Lopdell House Gallery)

Lifestyle & Contemporary Culture: Ladies, A Plate: Traditional Home Baking by Alexa Johnston (Penguin Group NZ)

Reference & Anthology: Collected Poems 1951-2006 by CK Stead (Auckland University Press)

Te Reo Māori: He Pātaka Kupu te kai a te rangatira, (A Storehouse of Words – the food of chiefs)

New Zealand Society of Authors (NZSA) Best First Book Awards

Fiction: The Rehearsal by Eleanor Catton (Victoria University Press)

Poetry: Everything Talks by Sam Sampson (Auckland University Press)

Non-Fiction: Mates & Lovers: A Gay History of New Zealand by Chris Brickell (Random House NZ)

For media reactions see:

•  Emily Perkins wins Montana Medal tvnz.co.nz
• Writer ‘at height of her powers’ nzherald.co.nz

And it looks like Robyn (who is at the ceremony tonight) has broken her hoodoo and picked some winners this time!

Brassica Galactica

We talked earlier about favourite cookbooks, yes us blogging lot have been known to mention food occasionally. One of my recent finds in Sunday Times Style magazine was an Q & A interview with Allegra McEvedy, one of the founders of a healthy fast food chain Leon. I liked her spin on cooking and food and life in general:

Who would be your dream date? Jamie Lee Curtis, circa the mid-1980s.
Do you have a signature look?My friends would say brown, probably suity, with a bit of trilby action.

So I was pleased to see she’s put out a cookbook. The description in the library catalogue (and the groovy retro cover) means it was whipped onto my reserve list pronto:

“The Ingredients Book” arms you with everything you need to know about the basic building blocks of any recipe. Leon chooses it’s ingredients above all for their flavour and healthiness but also with a view to the world we live in, so that such shark-infested waters as sustainable fish are tackled and easy to navigate. In the first half of the book Leon’s top 250 fruits, vegetables, fish, meats, dairy and store cupboard ingredients are all given their own entries … You will also travel to the outer-starburst that is ‘Brassica Galatica’, discover ‘Passports for Herbs’ and have your very own pull-out “Rainbow Seasonality Guide”.The second half is “The Recipe Book” – this is where you can put your newly found knowledge of ingredients to great use. Here are over 140 recipes: some are familiar favourites taken from Leon’s menus such as the Original Superfood Salad, Moroccan Meatballs or Magic Mackerel Couscous and, for those Leon Lovers everywhere, at last a recipe for the coveted Leon Better Brownie … Leon’s food message is a simple and honest one – cook and eat with the best ingredients available…and don’t forget the naughty bits that are so necessary for a fully-rounded life. Food is the greatest pastime we all share, and this book will fill you with interest, warmth and smiles like being shown round a garden you’ve always loved by a gardener you slightly fancy.

Yumminess!

Put te reo in your day-o

It’s Te wiki o te reo Māori, and Ngā kete wānanga o Ōtautahi is encouraging people to have a go at using te reo every day this week. Each of our libraries has a Māori name, and to help with pronunciation, we have sound files for each one. Find your local library’s name.

The Māori name of Christchurch is Ōtautahi. Check out our website Ti Kouka Whenua to find out where the name Ōtautahi comes from and discover other local Māori place names. Perhaps the place where you live is listed?