Last evening I attended a packed launch for this title at TriBeca in Parnell. I don't know Paul Holmes but I have long regarded him as an exceptional broadcaster. He hosted the highly successful Paul Holmes Breakfast Show on Newstalk ZB for more than 20 years and through much of that time he also hosted the nightly TV current affairs show, HOLMES. Although he has a weekly column in the Weekend Herald I have never thought of him as a writer, no he was/is a broadcaster.
Well I have changed my mind, he is also a damned fine writer as is witnessed by the book launched last evening. As I have said before on this blog I am not often to be found reading non-fiction, give me a crime novel any day, but as publishers Hachette had given me a review copy of this book I decided I would read the opening sections on my way across the city on the Link Bus. I did this and was engrossed from the outset. The minute I got home from the launch, more about the launch shortly, I resumed reading and carried on far into the night and today shortly before lunch I finished the 448 page book.
I hasten to immediately offer my congratulations to the author. He has taken an immensely complicated subject - the crash of Air New Zealand flight TE 901 on Antarctica's Mt.Erebus in November 1979 - and having read everything ever written on the subject, official and unofficial, and conducting scores of interviews, and doing an immense and impressive amount of research, he has presented us with a book that is gripping, riveting and totally readable and accessible. I couldn't put it down.
Publisher Kevin Chapman of Hachette said in introducing Paul Holmes to the audience last night said that this was an unapologetically crusading book and it certainly is that. As retired law lecturer Stuart Macfarlane says in his foreword "Paul Holmes has written the book on the Erebus scandal that has been crying out to be written ever since some members of the old Air New Zealand management ot away with the greatest cover-up and wrongful passing of blame in New Zealand's history".
Macfarlane should know because he is the author of The Erebus Papers, the" Erebus encyclopedia", and he is widely regarded as the authority on the subject.
In his remarks last night Holmes didn't pull any punches - “Despite the Privy Council agreeing with Mahon completely on causation... Chippindale never, ever, changed his mind or conceded an inch. He was unbelievable and he had the full support and the might of a malevolent and malignant Prime Minister behind him.
He also paid tribute to the Collins family - “This is a night for the good people. There are so many special people amongst us here who have fought the good corner... and fought for the Collins family for decades. They have all heard of each other, but several of them have never met each other.
I must welcome first, Maria Collins and her daughters, Kathryn, Elizabeth Pip and Adrienne.
They are the survivors. They are the courageous people. Thank you for telling me your stories. This is your night. Let’s hope it might lead where we want it to... a full parliamentary exoneration of Jim Collins and Greg Cassin.”
He concluded " I’ve tried to make the book clear and the explanation of the accident clear so that everyone can at last understand what happened. And what went on behind the scenes. This is truly an incredible New Zealand story.”
This is indeed an incredible New Zealand story Paul Holmes, you do not exaggerate, and you have told it so well; I thank you and congratulate you for that. Be very proud of what you have achieved.You have clearly invested a huge amount of emotional energy into this book project and that emotion bubbled to the surface on several occasions when you were speaking.
And I was not at all surprised that after speaking you spent almost two hours signing copies of your book because this is a book every New Zealander should read and I hope it finds its way into the public and high school libraries across the land. For those that want to own their own copy, and I am sure there will be many, you will find it at your local bookshop, rrp $49.99
Below some photographs taken at last night's launch.
From bottom to top:
Paul Holmes signing copies of his book
Margarita Mahon and Inspector Greg Gilpin
Pip Collins, Maurice Williamson, Margarita Mahon and Maria Collins
Nikki Kaye, Maria Collins and Kathryn Schollum
Sir Don McKinnon, Pip Collins, Kathryn Collins and Mark Sainsbury
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