Writing Works Aotearoa

Keen eyes will have spotted posters for this book around the city. This beautifully written novel explores the suffering and resilience of Avani, an indentured labourer sent to Fiji in the late nineteenth century. In alternative chapters we follow the fortunes of Meera in Auckland and India, as she tries to discover her occluded, damaged genealogy. Avani is her great-grandmother. Many novels with split time schemes labour under the yoke but in BANJARA both epochs are richly and emotionally evoked. A triumph!

What a phenomenal writer was Defoe! I have just read 'Robinson Crusoe' (1719) and 'Moll Flanders' (1722) and loved them both, having forgiven him, finally, for stealing Aphra Behn's thunder. Aphra introduced dialogue into the novel. Occasionally Defoe allows his characters to speak but mostly conversations are in reportage. There are no chapter breaks, so there is the sense of life going on in real time, particularly on Crusoe's island. Worth a read if you enjoy archaic language and a journey back in time.