Auckland Writers Festival 2015

Where to start?   Well first off let me say it was the biggest and best yet. Have such crowds ever been seen before in the Aotea Centre?

Warmest congratulations to Anne O'Brien and her team on producing such a wonderful programme that gave so much pleasure to so many over the weekend.

This Festival, already recognised as the most important  Writers Festival in New Zealand has clearly become one of the most significant Writers Festivals in the world. Well done Anne O'Brien.

Here for me are just some of the highlights :

A Law Legend: Sir Peter Williams

Leading Men

Gallipoli & other stories

Guild Hunting - Nalini Singh - The paranormal romance queen and NZ's biggest selling author with over six million books sold.






The Games We Play
Peter Fitzsimons, Greg McGee and Karen Nimmo
A hugely entertaining and funny session with raconteur extraordinaire Peter Fitzsimons in his element but nicely balanced by our own Greg McGee and sports phsycologist Karen Nimmo. A huge range of subjects was covered including sledging, length of the rugby season, mental fatigue,  concussion, sponsorship, Aussie Rules, captaincy.

Bond & Beyond - Anthony Horowitz
Another wonderful session, ably chaired by Melbourne visitor Michael Williams.
Anthony Horowitz mines the world of spooks and gumshoes to craft great books. Creator of The Diamond Brothers, Alex Rider and The Power of Five (aka The Gatekeepers) series for younger readers, and the author of Conan Doyle estate-approved novels The House of Silk and Moriarty for grown-ups, he also writes extensively for television including for cosies Poirot, Midsomer Murders and Foyle’s War. 
His latest commission from the Ian Fleming Estate, is a new James Bond novel.. We were privileged to hear him read the opening paragraph of the yet to be revealed title.

In the Light of What We Know - Zia Haider Rahman
Louise Adler is a fan, as are Joyce Carol Oates and James Wood. Last year, former human rights lawyer Zia Haider Rahman produced his novel In the Light of What We Know, a personal and political exploration of the world post-9/11. The Observer’s Alex Preston calls it “an extraordinary meditation on the limits and uses of human knowledge, a heartbreaking love story and a gripping account of one man’s psychological disintegration”. Rahman was in conversation with Metro editor Simon Wilson. who had done his homework well. 


Loss & Love
One of the many free events. In this one three NZ and one Australian writers each read for 10 minutes on the theme of Loss *& Love - Tracy Farr, Laurence Fearnley, Bridget van der Zipp, and Tim Winton were the readers/writers and the audience went away happily afterwards.

An Hour with Tim Winton

I think for me this was probably my favourite session of the whole Festival. Wonderfully chaired by Jim Mora the ASB Theatre was filled to capacity on all three levels.
This wonderful writer, arguably Austraiia's finest contemporary author, is a modest man, quite a philosopher too. I was spellbound.

Carol Ann Duffy

Getting the UK Poet Laureate was a real coup for the Festival and what a wonderful hour we had with her and her host John Campbell. Her subversive sense of humour shone through her superb poetry readings and her conversations with Campbell,who is a known lover of poetry,.and was the perfect person for the role. Another stunning session.

2015 Honoured New Zealand Writer - C,K.Stead
C.K. Stead is one of New Zealand’s foremost literary figures. And how special, and appropriate that he should be responsible for bringing the enormously successful 2015 Festival to a conclusion.

A distinguished novelist, literary critic, poet, essayist and Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Auckland, Stead has won many awards and fellowships. He became a Member of the Order of New Zealand in 2007, and is one of only two living writers to hold that honour. Internationally published and reviewed, Stead’s major novels include Smith’s Dream, All Visitors Ashore, My Name Was Judas, Mansfield, Talking About O’Dwyer, The Singing Whakapapa, and The Secret History of Modernism, alongside essays, criticism and major poetry collections.