The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.
AUCKLAND
1 Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins (Scholastic, $30)
The unstoppable Suzanne Collins’ latest return to the brutal world of Panem and its Hunger Games. May the odds be ever in the favour of all of those waiting for Sunrise on the Reaping in the library reserve queues.
2 Careless People: A Story of Where I Used to Work by Sarah Wynn-Williams (Pan UK, $40)
The Meta exposé written by the New Zealander that everyone is talking about. Julie Hill reviewed the book for The Spinoff – here’s a snippet: “Her heavily filtered dream of a Facebook where democracy and transparency would prevail is far from the truth. As a company it’s unethical, illegal, casually dishonest, and it dawns on her that its actions are harming children, taking a wrecking ball to journalism and allowing misinformation to flourish.”
3 Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (Penguin, $38)
A new novel with a fantastically intriguing premise: “Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. Home to the world’s largest seed bank, Shearwater was once full of researchers. But with sea levels rising, the Salts are now its final inhabitants, packing up the seeds before they are transported to safer ground. Despite the wild beauty of life here, isolation has taken its toll on the Salts. Raff, 18 and suffering his first heartbreak, can only find relief at his punching bag; Fen, 17, has started spending her nights on the beach among the seals; 9-year-old Orly, obsessed with botany, fears the loss of his beloved natural world; and Dominic can’t stop turning back towards the past, and the loss that drove the family to Shearwater in the first place.
Then, during the worst storm the island has ever seen, a woman washes up on shore. As the Salts nurse the woman, Rowan, back to life, their suspicion gives way to affection, and they finally begin to feel like a family again. Rowan, long accustomed to protecting her heart, begins to fall for the Salts, too. But Rowan isn’t telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers the sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realises Dominic is keeping his own dark secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, the characters must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it’s too late-and if they can finally put the tragedies of the past behind them to create something new, together.”
4 Butter by Asako Yuzuki (Fourth Estate, $35)
Read the novel, then see the author at Auckland Writers Festival this May.
5 Orbital by Samantha Harvey (Jonathan Cape, $26)
Read the novel, then see the 2024 Booker Prize winner at the Auckland Writers Festival this May.
6 The Vegetarian by Han Kang (Portobello Books, $28)
A woman’s sudden vegetarianism is an act of resistance as much as a response to violence. An unforgettable, haunting novel.
Turkish writer and activist Elif Shafak has long been a voice for human rights. Her novels explore the ways people are subject to violence and inherited trauma, as well as the ways people are engineers of connection and love. As Turkish populations are right now fighting authoritarianism, Shafak’s novels are one way to understand the history and ongoing struggles of the people and place.
10 The Practice of Not Thinking: A Guide to Mindful Living by Ryunosuke Koike (Penguin, $26)
Maybe Mike Waltz had been reading this when he invited a journalist onto his work chat.
WELLINGTON
1 Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins (Scholastic, $30)
2 Clay Eaters by Gregory Kan (Auckland University Press, $30)
Stunning new poetry that you can get a glimpse of right here on The Spinoff.
3 The Let Them Theory by Mel Robbins (Hay House, $32)
The gist seems to be that by “letting them”, people reveal to you who they actually are and then you can make an informed decision about how/if/when and why you let them in your life.
4 Over Under Fed by Amy Marguerite (Auckland University Press, $25)
Another stunning new collection of poetry (co-launched with Gregory Kan’s Clay Eaters, above last week at Unity Books Wellington). Books editor Claire Mabey closely read Marguerite’s poem, mount street cemetery, in the How to Read a Poem column, here.
5 Orbital by Samantha Harvey (Jonathan Cape, $26)
6 Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Fourth Estate, $38)
7 Amma by Saraid de Silva (Hachette, $38)
Longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction! Saraid de Silva is the forthcoming recipient at the Randell Cottage’s legendary long-term writers residency. However, Randell Cottage is urgently fundraising to support her six-month stint after Creative New Zealand didn’t award the Cottage funding (due to lack of available cash).
8 I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman (Vintage, $33)
Thirty-nine women are kept in isolation in a cage in a post-apocalyptic world.
9 The Vegetarian by Han Kang (Portobello Books, $28)
10 You Are Here by Whiti Hereaka & Peata Larkin (Massey University Press, $45)
The latest in the Massey University Press series of beautiful books that bring a writer and visual artist together. Here’s the description: “In a feat of managed imagining, Hereaka’s words spiral out to the centre of the book and then back in on themselves to end with the same words with which the text began. As the pattern spools out and then folds back, Peata Larkin’s meticulous drawings of tāniko and whakairo and her lush works on silk weave their own entrancing pattern.”
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