Jul292017

Marsden Books Newsletter July 2017

This week happens to be National Grief Week. Consequently, we are showcasing our grief books which are a mixture of memoirs and guides to dealing with the death of a loved one.

We also have a comprehensive collection of books for young children to help them
understand death, whether it is a close family member, a pet, or just a question being asked about death.

There are also some excellent books, recently published, discussing our approach to death as a society. For example “Being Mortal” by Atal Gawande and “The Way We Die Now” by Seamus O’Mahony.

Childrens’ Bookshop: It is with great sadness that we say goodbye to John MacIntyre from The Children’s Bookshop. In the spirit of cooperation that prevails amongst the Wellington booksellers, he was a great support and mentor to many of us. He will be missed.

John ran the bookshop in partnership with his wife Ruth, who is now leading a great little team at the Children’s Bookshop. We will continue to support her and the shop and wish her well as she steps into John’s shoes.

Lonely Planet Promotion: Lonely Planet is now producing a wonderful range of children’s books, activities and guides. We will be running a promotion in August to showcase these.

NZ Post: There have been some changes to NZ Post prices. These are only affecting Fastpost letters and some increases to international post parcels.

Facebook and Instagram: We now have the lovely Belinda Robins managing our Facebook page and Instagram. She is making a huge impact for us with the increased communication offered and the opportunity to see daily the books we are promoting. This has also meant that out-of-town customers can get a better idea of the books available here and have books posted to them. If you are not following us on Facebook it would be worth a look. You can access via our website if you are not on Facebook. Marsdenbooks.co.nz

NZ Children’s Book Awards: We have a display of all the finalists for the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. The winners will be announced in August.

Music: Beatrice is busy collating a wonderful collection of CDs and is happy to take orders. She is in the shop on Fridays if you would like the chance to talk to her.

In the meantime, Happy Reading from the team at Marsden Books.

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Mar062017

Marsden Books Newsletter March 2017

Now that we are well into 2017, the year of the Rooster, the Marsden Books team is working hard to stock the best books, cards, and extra little treasures you might need. It is great to see our fellow local businesses in Marsden Village thriving and enjoying much deserved support. In the difficult times, some communities such as Christchurch and Kaikoura have faced, the importance of a supportive local community comes to the fore.

“Leap of Faith”
We are thrilled to be hosting an event to celebrate Jenny Pattrick’s new novel Leap of Faith.
Thursday April 6th
5.30pm at St Ninians in Karori.
Refreshments and seating will be available so join us to hear Jenny talk about the book and read from it.
Please rsvp by 3 April.
Copies of the book will be available to buy at the event, and Jenny will be happy to sign them then.

Gecko Promotion:
For the month of March, we are promoting local publisher Gecko. Buy a Gecko book during the month of March and go into the draw to win a wonderful collection of their children’s books.

The winner will be able to nominate a local school or preschool to receive an identical collection of Gecko books. Our thanks to Gecko publishers for their support of this promotion.

Facebook followers can be in to win a copy of The Gecko Annual edited by Kate de Goldi and Susan Paris. You can access our Facebook page here.

Stocktake:
Our stocktake will be on April 1st which means the shop will close early at 1 pm.

Easter Hours:
CLOSED: Good Friday, 14 April.
OPEN: Saturday 9 till 3.
CLOSED: Easter Sunday and Monday

Books To Look Forward To by some of our favourite authors:

Leap of Faith by Jenny Pattrick. A vivid novel about ingenuity and hard slog, crooks and dreamers, bootleggers and love, during the construction of the main Trunk Railway line, set in a rugged difficult landscape.

Birdcage Walk by Helen Dunmore. An unsettling mystery set in Britain in the 1700’s as the French Revolution takes hold just across the water.

House of Names by Colm Toibin. A retelling of the story of Clytemnestra and her children.-spectacularly audacious, violent, vengeful, lustful, and instantly compelling.

How to Measure a Cow by Margaret Forster. This is her last novel published after her death last year and written in her wonderful style reminiscent of her best earlier novels.

Breaking Ranks by James McNeish. Three distinct stories about three New Zealanders, a doctor, a soldier and a judge, but with one thing in common — they all paid the price for standing up for what they believed in.

 

We welcome Charlotte and Emily Sinclair who will be working on Saturdays. They have shown a great passion for reading and will now be able to share that knowledge with our customers. We look forward to having them as part of our team at Marsden Books.

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Feb172017

The Book of Bees

Piotr Sacha tracks the history of bees from the age of dinosaurs to their current plight, examining along the way the role bees have played in history and in the rest of the natural world.

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Feb162017

Children’s best books February 2017

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Feb162017

Best books February 2017

Non-fiction

 

Fiction

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Dec032016

Christmas Book List 2016

Non-Fiction

Fiction

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Dec032016

The Story Orchestra

The Story Orchestra: Four Seasons in One Day

The Story Orchestra: Four Seasons in One Day Illustrated by Jessica Courtney-Tickle

The Story Orchestra: Four Seasons in One Day
Illustrated by Jessica Courtney-Tickle

From the dawn chorus to an icy sunset, follow one girl and her dog as they adventure through spring, summer, autumn, and winter in just one day.

On each page you can hear the story come to life with music from Vivaldi’s ‘The Four Seasons’, then listen to all the sounds again at the back of the book.

 

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Dec032016

Children’s Best Books for Christmas

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Nov052016

Man Booker Prize 2016

The Sellout by Paul Beatty

The Sellout
by Paul Beatty

 

A biting satire about a young man’s isolated upbringing and the race trial that sends him to the Supreme Court, Paul Beatty’s The Sellout showcases a comic genius at the top of his game. It challenges the sacred tenets of the United States Constitution, urban life, the civil rights movement, the father-son relationship, and the holy grail of racial equality―the black Chinese restaurant.

Born in the “agrarian ghetto” of Dickens―on the southern outskirts of Los Angeles―the narrator of The Sellout resigns himself to the fate of lower-middle-class Californians: “I’d die in the same bedroom I’d grown up in, looking up at the cracks in the stucco ceiling that’ve been there since ’68 quake.” Raised by a single father, a controversial sociologist, he spent his childhood as the subject in racially charged psychological studies. He is led to believe that his father’s pioneering work will result in a memoir that will solve his family’s financial woes. But when his father is killed in a police shoot-out, he realizes there never was a memoir. All that’s left is the bill for a drive-thru funeral.

Fueled by this deceit and the general disrepair of his hometown, the narrator sets out to right another wrong: Dickens has literally been removed from the map to save California from further embarrassment. Enlisting the help of the town’s most famous resident―the last surviving Little Rascal, Hominy Jenkins―he initiates the most outrageous action conceivable: reinstating slavery and segregating the local high school, which lands him in the Supreme Court.

 

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Nov052016

Ockham Fiction Book Award 2016

Coming Rain by Stephen Daisley

Coming Rain
by Stephen Daisley

 

A universal story of love and aspiration, betrayal and disappointment, the prose is masterful, simple and moving. The characters are utterly believable and complex in their ordinariness. The author’s portrayal of hard physical tasks in conjunction with the mental effort required to carry on in the face of everyday obstacles and heartbreak is a thing of beauty.

“Coming Rain is a universal story of love and aspiration, betrayal and disappointment. The prose is masterful, simple and moving. The characters are utterly believable and complex in their ordinariness. It was a book that all three judges came across joyfully and read with the ease of those who know they’re in the hands of a confident writer.” Jill Rawnsley, convenor of the 2016 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards Fiction category

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