Interview with Kate Constable, author of 'New Guinea Moon'

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I love a book that opens up my world and teaches me a little something - and I certainly got an education reading Kate Constables' latest young adult novel, New Guinea Moon.  

I knew nothing of Australia's colonization history with Papua New Guinea, of our bloody beginnings in that country or their relatively recent independence from us.  

That's partly why I loved Constables' book - she's drawing on her own life, when she lived in PNG with her family as a young girl. But she has further explored this tumultuous time with a beautiful coming-of-age story, until the two seem parallel - a young girl gaining independence for herself at the same time that a country is doing the same.  

This is a beautiful book, and I was very lucky to ask some questions of its author. 

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Q: Are you a ‘plotter’ or a ‘pantser’ - that is, do you meticulously plot your novel before writing, or do you ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ and let the story evolve naturally?

I am definitely a plotter. Plotting, which is really just working out the story, is almost my favourite part of the writing process. I think perhaps it's because I’m an uptight Virgo, and I like to know where I'm going before I start the journey! But having said that, I like to keep the plot fairly loose, to allow for those moments of serendipity that arise while you're actually writing.

Q: How long did it take you to write ‘New Guinea Moon’, from first idea to final manuscript?

 This one took a long time, for me! I think it's been about three years from deciding, right, I want to write a book about PNG, to handing in the manuscript.

 

Q: Where do story ideas generally start for you? Do you first think of the character, theme, ending? Or is it just a free-fall?

It's weird, but I think I usually start with a setting! Place is very important to me, and I like to have a clear idea of where my story is set before I begin. Often a story idea will arise out of a setting, as it did with New Guinea Moon. Or I might have an idea for a theme -- with Winter of Grace, which was part of the Girlfriend Fiction series, I thought, hm, I'd like to see a book for teenage girls that deals with religion and spirituality from an open, questioning point of view. So I wrote one!

Q: So, the old advice goes “write what you know” – but it took you nearly 10 years to write a book that seems to be very much based on your own life and experiences. Your family moved to New Guinea when you were six, so your father could work there as a pilot. I’m sure many people would have told you over the years that your life in New Guinea was story-worthy. So what prompted you to write ‘New Guinea Moon’ now? And was it harder to show this book to your friends and family, knowing that it is so informed by your own history?

 As you say, it sounds like an obvious subject! I had previously written a couple of short stories based on my family's time in PNG, and I've always had it in the back of my mind that I'd like to write more about that time and place. But paradoxically, I think being so close to the subject matter did make it more difficult to choose a story and find characters. I needed a few different shots at it before it came together. In the beginning I wasn't even sure if the book would be fiction or memoir, or if it would be aimed at children, young adults or adults - and that was even before I started wrestling with the plot and characters! And it was hard to show it to my parents, especially. I was afraid they'd think the characters were based on them - which they emphatically were not, even though a lot of our family experiences and memories found their way into the book. I think it might have brought back some fairly painful memories for my Mum, who didn't really enjoy her time in PNG. So that was hard.

Q: ‘New Guinea Moon’ is set in December 1974, when change is in the air. Indeed, the following year the eastern half of the island was granted independence from Australia. At one point your protagonist, Julie, muses that the ‘Europeans’ are already speaking of New Guinea with a wistfulness and nostalgia – knowing that everything is on the brink of change. What do you remember of this time, and how much were you relying on your own memories when writing ‘New Guinea Moon’? What sort of research did you do for the book – and did that include speaking to your own family about your time living there? 

I was pretty young when my family lived in PNG -- I was only eleven when we left. I do remember a certain atmosphere in the air around the time of Independence, a weird mix of excitement and apprehension, but I couldn't really make much sense of it at the time. At the time Independence was declared, I was only about nine. But I read a lot of memoirs of Australian expats who were there at that time and it illuminated the scene for me - the political situation and how that affected the expat residents, and of course the Papua New Guineans themselves. I think a lot of expats had built up very comfortable lives for themselves and thought things would continue in the same way indefinitely, moving very very slowly toward self-government, over many decades. But then the Whitlam government came into power and suddenly everything was fast-tracked, compressed into a couple of years. Even some Papua New Guineans, especially in the Highlands, thought the process was too rushed. So it was a very unsettled time, everyone's expectations were turned upside-down, and quite a lot of expats actually did sell up and leave. I remember being quite thrilled about the new flag, and the new coinage, and I remember the Independence parade in Mt Hagen, and the new flag being raised for the first time. Even as a child, I found it a very moving day. Reading the memoirs of expats, they are all filled with this overwhelming nostalgia and mourning for a lost paradise. It was interesting to try to juxtapose that very real love and grief with the political and historical reality for Papua New Guinean citizens themselves, and the huge optimism and excitement that Independence meant for them.

Q: As much as ‘New Guinea Moon’ is about Julie exploring this beautiful island and finding her independence – there’s also a large focus on family. She’s getting to know her father, who she hasn’t seen since she was three-years-old. And, while she’s away from home, she’s realizing that she isn’t so different from her mother, Caroline, and that might not be such a bad thing. Then there is the Crabtree children, and Julie sees how different their family is (indeed, they admit to being raised by their 'mami' - maid - and feel a maternal bond to her). So often in YA parental characters are pushed to the side and are non-existent or cardboard cutouts. Why do you think it’s important to represent realistic parental relationships in YA?

It's funny you should say that, because I've been guilty of pushing the parents aside myself in the past - or at least one parent! In fiction, I mean! Sometimes I think it can feel as if the stage is just too crowded in a YA novel - if you have lots of friendship and love relationships going on, it's hard to make room to explore family relationships as well. And of course during your teenage years, you do separate yourself to some extent from your parents and your family generally, and feel more closely bonded to your peers. So in a way that emphasis is natural in a YA novel. But of course your parents are still hugely important - your relationship with them shapes the person that you've become, to a large extent, however much young people might want (or need) to deny it! Perhaps since I've become a parent myself, I look on the parental figures with slightly more sympathy! Give them a break, they're doing the best they can!

Q: There's also fascinating explorations into racism and colonialism in 'New Guinea Moon', which Julie seems to notice a lot more because she's the outsider coming in (plus, she has her mother's leftist/radical leanings in the back of her mind) - Julie really sees the "us" and "them" mentality and sympathises with the quest for independence. Was that something you felt growing up - or is it only now when you look back that you see the colonial roots of that 1970's society and how wrong it was?

I have to say that Julie's attitude was one I wish I'd had, rather than the attitude I did have at the time. When you're a child, you take so much for granted; it's just the way the world is, and you don't question it - I never questioned our segregated schools, for example, or having house servants (though we only briefly had a meri, most of the time we had no servants). But I do remember being uncomfortable, as a child in PNG, with some of the casual racism around us, and also with the huge disparity in material wealth between us, the privileged expat community, and most of the local inhabitants. That awareness and discomfort was something I did carry into adolescence and adulthood, I don't think that has ever left me. But as a child, I never understood WHY things were like that. Those were the sorts of questions I really wanted Julie to ask.

Q: Did you go back and visit Papua New Guinea when you were writing the book how much has it changed from when you were a child growing up there?

I would dearly love to go back, and I applied for a grant to allow me to revisit PNG, but unfortunately I didn't get it! But later on I was glad, actually, because if I had gone back, I think the new experience would have overlaid my old memories and wiped them out, if that makes sense. Just judging from videos on YouTube, things seem more chaotic than I remember. I have photos of the mains street of Mt Hagen in the mid-70s, and it's all very neat and orderly; now those same streets look much wilder and more dilapidated. I would love to be able to take my father back to PNG one day - he misses the place.

Q: You’ve written so expansively – in fantasy with the ‘Chanters of Tremaris’ series, for younger readers with ‘Cicada Summer’ and ‘Crow Country’ and now a contemporary young adult novel in ‘New Guinea Moon’. Do you set out to write in so many genres and for varying readerships – or is it always the story and characters informing such paths?

That's an interesting question! Personally I think that my writing always settles at about the same level, which crosses over that upper primary/lower secondary divide. So what determines the readership really becomes the subject matter -- the realist books, with more mature themes, seem to push up into YA, and the books with magical/fantasy elements tend to be pitched as children's books. But I have to say that my own preferred reading is a really good, layered children's book -- and that's what I mostly try to write.

Q: ‘Crow Country’ was a huge success, winning the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award for Younger Readers in 2012. How is it writing the follow-up to such a huge literary success? Do you feel more pressure?

 A little bit! I think it helps that New Guinea Moon is such a different kind of book - a realist, historical YA book, with more of a romantic emphasis, rather than Crow Country 2! And New Guinea Moon was almost finished by the time Crow Country started winning awards - so it was too late to worry by then anyway!

Q: What are you working on right now, and when can we expect it to hit shelves?

I'm working on another time-slip book for younger readers, which is a mixture of The Block, My Place and a ghost story. I've got it all plotted out, so now I just have to write it! I'm hoping to finish it before the end of the year, so maybe it might be out some time in 2014?

Q: Favourite author(s) of all time?

Oh, that is such a hard question. I have so many favourites! Nancy Mitford, Rumer Godden, Lucy M. Boston, Antonia Forest, Helen Garner... how long have you got?

Q: Favourite book(s)?

Another tough question. But I decided once that if books were outlawed and I had to memorise one book to keep it alive, I would memorise The Secret Garden.

Q: What advice do you have for budding young writers?

Read, read, read everything you can. And write as much as you can, too. I was calling myself a writer for ten years before my first book was published, so don't give up!

New Guinea Moon is published by Allen & Unwin and is now available at all good bookshops and online

'New Guinea Moon' by Kate Constable

Received from the Publisher

From the BLURB:

Julie has grown up not knowing her father, with just the occasional Christmas card and the knowledge that he flies planes for a charter company in New Guinea. When she comes to stay with him one long summer, she learns to appreciate not only her long-lost father and his love of flying, but also New Guinea itself and the people she meets. An awkward romance with a young expat contrasts with her growing attraction to the son of a local coffee plantation owner. And, left to her own devices much of the time, Julie learns to rely on herself and gain her own independence. A tragedy and then a mystery leave her reeling, but force her to evaluate what she really wants out of life.

It’s December 1974, and after tensions reach boiling-point between Julie and her mother, Caroline suggests she spend the Christmas break with her father in Papua New Guinea. 

Julie has not seen Tony McGinty, her father, since she was a child. She has sent him sparse cards, but she knows nothing about him except that he lives in Mt Hagen, flying planes for Highland Air Charters.

When Julie touches down in Papua New Guinea, the heat is stifling and her bags are promptly stolen – only to be saved by a charismatic local who is home from his Australian school, Simon Murphy. Simon’s father, Patrick, was one of the first ‘Europeans’ (white people) to pave their way on the island – he went on to marry a local woman, and now runs a successful plantation, though he’s getting on in years and it looks as though Simon will soon be taking over.

Julie and Simon travel together in a small plane to Mt Hagen, where Julie once again meets the father she has never known. Tony quickly introduces Julie to his island ‘family’ – his boss is Allan ‘Curry’ Crabtree, whose wife is Barbara and they have two children, the young Nadine and Ryan, who is Julie’s age – all home from their Australian boarding schools for the holidays.

The Crabtree’s seem to be the centre of European socializing on the island. All the chartered pilots who work for Allan come to their house for festivities and parties, and Barbara is self-appointed matriarch overseeing all.

But while Julie is taken-aback by the beauty of the island, the sweetness of the locals and her tentative new relationship with Tony . . .  she is also seeing an ugly underbelly to the European ‘settlers’. They have servants they call ‘meri’ and ‘haus boi’ – white expats don’t mix with locals, and want very little to do with them at all. And talk of independence stirs the air – people like Barbara Crabtree are convinced there will be riots in the streets, and Europeans murdered in their sleep. 

Just when Julie feels herself settling into the beauty of Papua New Guinea, and envisioning her life with Tony post-independence, tragedy strikes – and Julie questions everything she knows about right and wrong, family and confidence in herself.

‘New Guinea Moon’ is the new young adult novel from Australian author, Kate Constable. 

Kate Constable lived in Papua New Guinea from the age of six, when her father was a pilot on the island. She lived there for a number of years before she and her family relocated back to Australia. Knowing this now, it explains a lot of how ‘New Guinea Moon’ is such a thoughtfully detailed book, effortlessly capturing a time and place that at once reads so foreign and out-of-time, but tangible in many other respects.

Going into this book, I knew absolutely nothing about Papua New Guinea or its colonisation by Germany, the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth of Australia until independence from Australia in 1975.  I was actually quite shocked to learn that Australia had such roots in colonisation, so learnt from Britain, no doubt. It was an unsettling realization that Australia had such a history, and so very recently too! That’s why I was happy that in the book, Constable uses Julie’s outsider eyes to comment on the inequality she sees and feels disturbed by. Julie’s mother, Caroline, is portrayed as a leftist feminist and she is most certainly looking on Papua New Guinea and the Aussie expats with a thought to what her mother would think . . . but it speaks a lot to youthful intolerance that Julie so wonderfully articulates what she sees is wrong in this colonized society. Particularly because Julie has arrived in December 1974, and murmurings of independence are rife in the air and electrifying the people, locals and expats alike;  

‘They’ll kick us all out. This time next year, there won’t be any Europeans left, apart from the God-botherers.’ 

‘It’s the end of an era . . . it’ll never be the same.’ 

It’s odd, Julie thinks. There is anger in the way they speak, bitter resentment at their dismissal from the scene. But there is a wistfulness too, nostalgia for the lives they are still leading, as if they see themselves as ghosts already; they miss living here and they haven’t even left yet. Did the Romans sit around talking like this, before their empire fell?

Julie’s thoughts are also informed by the two families she comes to know on the island. The Crabtrees are well-to-do Aussies who have made their wealth with Highland Air Charters. Julie becomes uneasily close to Ryan Crabtree, a boy her age who seems to be in two minds – he once spoke fluent Pidgin, taught to him by the meri who helped raise him – but now he looks upon the locals with haughty disdain and seems to be allying with his mother on wanting to leave and live in Australia when independence comes. 

Then there’s Simon Murphy, the twenty-something handsome man who helps Julie get to Mt. Hagen. Simon is, quite literally, in two worlds – with an Australian father who was one of the first Europeans to settle on the island, but also with a New Guinean mother. Simon welcomes independence, and feels a duty to his home to return from his Australian studies and start running his father’s plantation business, contributing to the local economy and possibly looking into local politics. Simon is not one of the Europeans, rather he is seen as a ‘local’ in the eyes of the expats – as such, Simon sees the injustice of colonization and is excited by the prospect of his country standing on its own two feet.

There is a tinge of romance to ‘New Guinea Moon’ – though it pales in comparison to the far more interesting questions Constable raises about white ‘superiority’, and her provoking thoughts on Australia’s colonialist past. 

At times I wished there was more of a focus on Tony and Julie’s relationship – but I actually thought Julie grew closer to her mother, Caroline, while she was away from her. It was when Julie started asking herself what she thought of independence and Australia’s role in Papua New Guinea that I think Julie started to appreciate the different world-view her mother had equipped her with. By contrast, Tony is a sweet and shy man, never quite at-ease around his daughter . . . which is a shame; because I think there was a little more room for father/daughter bonding in this book. 

I really, thoroughly enjoyed ‘New Guinea Moon’. It is an unsettling book that beautifully and meticulously captures a dubious moment in Australia’s colonialist past. Papua New Guinea of the 1970s is magnificently evoked and seen through the eyes of a thoughtful and maturing young woman in Julie. There’s romance, tragedy and a deep respect for a wondrous country and its enduring people . . . 

5/5 

New Guinea Moon is published by Allen & Unwin and is now available at all good bookshops and online.

COVER REVEAL: 'Game. Set. Match.' by Jennifer Iacopelli

SYNOPSIS:


Nestled along the coastline of North Carolina, the Outer Banks Tennis Academy is the best elite tennis training facility in the world. Head Coach, Dominic Kingston has assembled some of the finest talent in the sport. From the game's biggest stars to athletes scraping and clawing to achieve their dreams, OBX is full of ego, drama and romance. Only the strong survive in this pressure cooker of competition, on and off the court.

Penny Harrison, the biggest rising star in tennis, is determined to win the French Open and beat her rival, the world’s number one player, Zina Lutrova. There’s just one problem, the only person who’s ever been able to shake her laser-like focus is her new training partner. Alex Russell, tennis’s resident bad boy, is at OBX recovering from a knee injury suffered after he crashed his motorcycle (with an Aussie supermodel on the back). He's hoping to regain his former place at the top of men’s tennis and Penny’s heart, while he’s at it.

Tennis is all Jasmine Randazzo has ever known. Her parents have seven Grand Slam championships between them and she’s desperate to live up to their legacy. Her best friend is Teddy Harrison, Penny’s twin brother, and that’s all they’ve ever been, friends. Then one stupid, alcohol-laced kiss makes everything super awkward just as she as she starts prepping for the biggest junior tournament of the year, the Outer Banks Classic.

The Classic is what draws Indiana Gaffney out of the hole she crawled into after her mom’s death. Even though she’s new to OBX, a win at the Classic is definitely possible. She has a big serve and killer forehand, but the rest of her game isn’t quite up to scratch and it doesn’t help that Jasmine Randazzo and her little minions are stuck-up bitches or that Jack Harrison, Penny’s agent and oldest brother, is too hot for words, not to mention way too old for her.

Who will rise? Who will fall? 

Told from rotating points of view, GAME. SET. MATCH., is a 'new adult' novel about three girls with one goal: to be the best tennis player in the world.

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Jennifer Iacopelli's GAME. SET. MATCH is one of my most-anticipated books for 2013 - I have been counting down the days until I can get my hands on the 'Outerbanks Tennis Academy' series. The first book is released May 1st, and this cover has just got me even more excited for the release! 

Here's what Jennifer has to say about her perty, perty cover;

My cover artist is the INCREDIBLE Erin Fitzsimmons, who also designed (and redesigned) the covers for Lauren Oliver's Delirium series! I love how it focuses on the girl, because the girls are truly the heart of this series, plus the couple really looks like Penny and Alex, one of the three couples featured in the OBX series. That's one of my pet peeves, when the models don't look anything like the characters! And of course, the kiss, because really, who doesn't a love a little kissing?! I adore the title treatment. The yellow brightening to the green brings out a fun tennis color scheme. So yes, lots of love from my end, but I fully admit, I may be a little biased. 

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Everyone, add GAME. SET. MATCH to your reading-lists and Goodreads shelves, because this is going to be a doozy of a series and definitely one to watch!

'The Storyteller' by Jodi Picoult

Received from the Publisher 

From the BLURB:

Sage Singer is a young woman who has been damaged by her past. Her solitary night work as a baker allows her to hide from the world and focus her creative energies on the beautiful bread she bakes.

Yet she finds herself striking up an unlikely friendship. Josef Weber is a quiet, grandfatherly man, well respected in the community; everyone's favourite retired teacher and Little League coach.

One day he asks Sage for a favour: to kill him. Shocked, Sage refuses.

Then Josef tells her that he deserves to die - and why.

What do you do when evil lives next door? Can someone who's committed horrendous acts ever truly redeem themselves? Is forgiveness yours to offer if you aren't the person who was wronged? And most of all - if Sage even considers his request - would it be murder, or justice?

Grief is meant to come in stages, but for Sage Singer, her mother’s death is a lingering torment that has turned her into a recluse. She has no contact with her two sisters; sure they blame her for their mother’s death. She has taken a graveyard-shift job at Our Daily Bread, baking with her grandmother’s recipes. And she has become tangled in a love affair with a married man - their relationship a convenient hide-away from the rest of the world. 

Now, Sage attends a grief group to work through her pain. It is here that she meets Josef Weber – an elderly man, popular in the community, who is trying to cope with his widowhood since his wife’s passing. The two strike up an unlikely friendship – and fall into a routine of nightly meetings at Our Daily Bread, where they talk and find comfort in one another.

But then Josef asks a favour of Sage – something so horrible, it sends her reeling and questioning if he had ulterior motives all along … Because Josef wants Sage to kill him. 

Josef reasons that he is an old, healthy man and his death is taking too long without someone to help him end things. And, of course, he deserves to die. Because Josef was once a member of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Totenkopf – a division of the Nazi Waffen-SS. 

Now Sage questions all of Josef’s kindly words, his easy friendship with her. He has come to Sage, of the only Jewish family in their predominantly Anglo-community, to end his life and beg forgiveness for past sins. Sins, Sage can barely begin to comprehend – but her grandmother can. 

Sage’s grandmother, Minka, was a Holocaust survivor. A Polish Jew, she lived in the ghettos with her family during the war, but it wasn’t long before tragedy struck and Minka’s family was ruined … and then she was put on a train to Auschwitz.

Confused and angered by Josef’s confession and his audacious request, Sage begins the lengthy process of finding someone to report him to – and she is eventually directed to the FBI, and Leo Stein of the Justice Department. It is Leo’s job to hunt down War Criminals of World War II, and bring them to justice. But he is racing against time – many of the Nazi party are either dead or dying, and all have been so deep in hiding for so many years… running from their corrupted pasts. 

‘The Storyteller’ is the new novel by Jodi Picoult.

Oradour-sur-Glane was a small commune in west-central France. On June 10, 1944 a German Waffen-SS company tore through the village, massacring 642 of its inhabitants and leaving very few survivors. All women and children were herded into the town’s Church while soldiers looted. The men, meanwhile, were led to six barns where machine guns were already in place; soldiers shot at legs first, not killing the villagers, but wounding them so they could not escape. They then set the barns and church on fire – anyone who tried to flee through the windows and doors met with machine-gun fire.

Oradour-sur-Glane remains one of the worst massacres of the Second World War – so horrendous was the destruction of this town, that a new village was built on a nearby site, and French president, Charles de Gaulle, declared the original village be maintained as a permanent memorial and museum. And the ruins remain, to be remembered.  

In 1953 there was a tribunal into the surviving 65 of the 200 German soldiers involved in the massacre. But the trial was a complex one, for the nationalities and ethnicities of the soldiers involved, and refusals to extradite. More trials were conducted in 1958 and 1983. And, just this year, it has been announced that German investigators have again opened a new inquiry into the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre after new evidence was uncovered in the archived files of Germany’s Stasi Secret Police. 

I mention Oradour-sur-Glane because (as with all Picoult stories) a central conundrum touched upon in ‘The Storyteller’ is whether or not Josef deserves to be punished, and if he can/should be forgiven for his past sins - just as many question whether too much time has passed for another investigation into the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre. 

One of the best scenes that addresses this thought-provoking issue is between Leo and a blind-date – a woman who doesn’t really ‘get’ what Leo does for a living, or why it’s such a big deal to jail these old guys who did wrong years ago. Leo’s fiery explanation is a stand-out; 

“The Nazis didn’t just target Jews. They also killed Gypsies and Poles and homosexuals and the mentally and physically disabled. Everyone should be invested in what my department does. Because if we’re not, what message is America sending to people who commit genocide? That they can get away with it, if enough time passes? They can hide inside our borders without even a slap on the wrist? We routinely deport hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens every year whose sole offence is that they overstayed a visa or came without the right paperwork – but people who were involved in crimes against humanity get to stay? And die peacefully here? And be buried on American soil?”

I think it should also be thought about in a modern-context. Think if Osama Bin Laden hadn’t been found and killed in 2011. I imagine you could have asked any American – 10, 20, 30 years since 9/11 – if the US Government should still expend forces to hunt him down, and they would have answered with a resounding ‘yes’. Now I think of the few survivors of the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre, nearly 70 years later, and they still speak of waiting for justice. And I can understand why. 

This question of redemption/forgiveness is a central focus of ‘The Storyteller’ – made even more complex when Picoult spends the entire middle of the novel in Minka’s point-of-view, first in the Jewish ghetto and then during her harrowing time at Auschwitz. Minka is, undoubtedly, the most compelling of all the narratives in the book – and by comparison the contemporary voices of Josef, Leo and Sage sometimes felt undercooked. 

Also interspersed throughout the book is the unfolding story that Minka had been writing since she was a young girl, dreaming of being a novelist. It is a tale of vampires and monsters, and as Minka revisited the story after surviving Auschwitz, it became an allegory for the real horrors and beasts she faced down. I will say that this was a part of the book that didn’t work for me – it became one of too many voices, between Josef, Minka, Leo, Sage and then this third-person story heaped on top. I would have preferred if Picoult had spent more time in the present, with Minka speaking to her granddaughter – though I understand that talking about her time in the War was too hard, so she gave Sage her story as a compensation of sorts. It was still one narrative too many. 

I also think Picoult spent too much time in the present with Josef and Sage at the beginning of the book. I think it would have been more impacting to spend time with them after we’d heard Minka’s story of survival. Then I think it could have been really interesting to read Sage grapple with her family history, and her own spirituality. She often remarks that she’s Jewish, but does not practice Judaism. But since Josef’s confession, and her asking questions of Minka, Sage starts to understand why her father always thought it was important that his children retain their religion; 

To me, it seemed they were following an abridged version of Judaism, so who were they to tell me tell me how and what to believe? I said this to me parents when I was lobbying to not have a bat mitzvah. My father got very quiet. The reason it’s important to believe in something, he said, is because you can. 

I also wish we’d spent more time with Josef at the end, rather than the beginning. I can see that Picoult wanted to lull Sage, and readers, into a false sense of him – as this sweet, old man – but we’re not surprised to discover his Nazi past, because it’s there in the blurb. We know what’s coming, and the drawn-out curveball of his confession is missing much punch. It would have actually been better if Picoult had kept the majority of present-day in the latter half of the story, rather than the beginning. I think it could have been much more hard-hitting to have to read Sage grapple with her ‘friendship’ with Josef if it had come after readers know of Minka’s awful Auschwitz story. 

I know that Picoult changed her US publishers last year – and ‘The Storyteller’ is her first book under a new imprint. Undoubtedly Picoult wants to push away from her oft-inappropriate ‘chick-lit’ label and accusations of formulaic writing. I won’t say that ‘The Storyteller’ is the best book to address the Holocaust or survivor stories. I actually think books by Morris Gleitzman, Suzy Zail and Ruta Sepetys (all released in the last couple of years) have been better. But Picoult does well to prod at current questions of guilt, forgiveness and accountability (as proven by the recent reopening of the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre case). And ‘The Storyteller’ is even more hard-hitting for the many wars raging now – in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria. . .  what Picoult does is remind us that history keeps repeating itself, and the hunt for culprits of WWII is still as relevant as those wars being fought right now, when authorities will eventually turn an eye to prosecuting those who acted outside of the Geneva convention and basic humanity. 

‘The Storyteller’ is also the best Picoult book of recent years – and the first one I've managed to read through (actually, I read it in 2 days!) and it feels closer to her better, old self. 

4/5 

'What's a Witch to Do?' Midnight Magic Mystery #1 byJennifer Harlow

Received from the Publisher

From the BLURB:

High Priestess might sound like an ’80s hair band, but its Mona McGregor’s life. She runs the Midnight Magic shop in Goodnight, Virginia, and leads a large coven. She’s also raising two nieces and hasn’t been with a man for fifteen years…until a handsome doctor takes an interest in her. But Mona’s life really heats up when Adam Blue, a sexy werewolf, arrives at her door. Adam informs her that someone wants her dead and he is there to protect her. Hell’s bells! When a demon begins stalking her, Mona has to suspect her coven members, and even her family.

With two handsome men and a determined demon after her, Mona teams up with Adam to find out who really wants her dead . . . and who really wants her.

Mona McGregor has always put family first. When her mother died, and her father shortly after, she took charge of her younger sisters Debbie and Ivy, practically raising the girls with the help of their Grandmother. And when Granny died, Mona took over the mantle as High Priestess of her coven. And just a few months ago when Ivy appeared on Mona’s doorstep pleading for help for herself and her two daughters, Sophie and Cora, Mona was there.

Mona always puts family first and herself second. So when Ivy disappeared in the middle of the night all those months ago, leaving Sophie and Cora in Mona’s care, she took a deep breath and prepared to dedicate the rest of her life to those two precious girls.

There’s a hectic few weeks ahead for Mona and her family. She’s busy running her Midnight Magic shop in Goodnight, Virginia, which caters to the thirty odd witches in town who Mona also oversees in her role as High Priestess of the local coven. Then there’s Debbie’s upcoming wedding, mere days away, which Mona has been helping to plan for her little sister. There’s little time left over for Mona’s love-life, which she is painfully reminded the lack thereof every time Sophie or Cora need a trip to the ER, and Mona is left to lust from afar over a certain handsome Dr. Guy.

So the very last thing Mona needs is a knock on her door late one night . . . a knock that heralds impending disaster not just for Mona, but her entire coven.

Adam Blue is bleeding on Mona’s doorstep. Adam is Beta to local Alpha werewolf, Jason Dahl, and Mona has known him for some eighteen years . . . but in all those years Adam has gone out of his way to avoid Mona, to the point that she thought he held a grudge against her. So she’s a little perplexed when Adam comes knocking for help, and bearing bad news that he got injured while trying to investigate a hired hit orchestrated against Mona. You see, someone within Mona’s coven hired Adam to assassinate her and pass the High Priestess title on. Only problem is, Adam doesn’t know who hired him. He only knows that Mona’s life is still in danger unless they find the guilty witch.

‘What’s a Witch to Do?’ is a new novel from Jennifer Harlow, it is a spin-off from her ‘F.R.E.A.K.S Squad Investigation’ series and the first book in the 'Midnight Magic Mystery' series.

I was over-the-moon thrilled to learn that Harlow’s ‘What’s a Witch to Do?’ is the first book in a new cozy paranormal mystery series – because I am officially onboard and invested. I am a big fan of the cozy mystery subgenre, in which crime and detection take place in a small, socially intimate community. But I’m also very picky about those I read. I was first introduced to ‘cozies’ via Charlaine Harris, when I trawled through her backlist and read ‘Lily Bard’, ‘Aurora Teagarden’ and ‘Harper Connelly’ (even ‘Sookie Stackhouse’ is, technically, a cozy series). Since Harris, the only other cozy I've really loved is Josh Lanyon’s ‘Adrien English’ series – and the main reason Lanyon and Harris are my favourite cozy writers is because they don’t downplay the sex/violence/romance as so many other (more tepid) cozies do. So I was thrilled when I got about three chapters into Harlow’s book, and started to think that ‘What’s a Witch to Do?’ reminded me, deliciously, of the classic cozies of Charlaine Harris.

I was invested in Mona McGregor from the moment I realized how much she has sacrificed in her life for family. She practically raised her two younger sisters when she was little more than a child herself. And then when her unreliable sister, Ivy, dumped her nieces Sophie and Cora on her doorstep in the middle of the night, she selflessly agreed to dedicate the second-half of her life to children who are not her own. Mona openly admits to having a deplorable romantic history because of all that she has given to others, leaving little room for pleasing herself. I always like reading an underdog, and Mona is certainly that, but equipped with a backbone of steel and a determinedly positive outlook on life.

The first few chapters of the book are dedicated to catching readers up on Mona’s helter-skelter life. We get to know her mostly out-of-whack routine with young nieces, Sophie and Cora, who are prone to minor injuries that take them to the emergency room (resulting in town gossip about Mona’s irresponsibility, but also provides Mona with an opportunity to drool over new to town Dr. Guy). Sophie and Cora have only just started to settle into life with Mona, after their mother left a few months ago. Now Mona is able to stand back and really take stock of the psychological scars Ivy has left on the two girls – ranging from an initial fear of bathing, to them not quite believing that Mona won’t disappear like their mother did.

Mona is also High Priestess of her local coven owns her own magic shop and is playing wedding planner for young sister, Debbie. So when a bleeding werewolf by the name of Adam Blue comes knocking on Mona’s door for help – and to bear the bad news that someone has hired an assassin to take Mona out – her life spirals even more out of control.

Something I loved about Harlow’s world-building in this novel is that it remains firmly focused in the small town of Goodnight, Virginia. Harlow briefly contextualizes the wider paranormal universe to say that supernatural beings are ‘out’ – there’s mention of a Goodnight Massacre and Vampire/Werewolf War in the early eighties. Mona is also part of the P.C.O – Preternatural CoOp, and when trouble starts brewing she does call the F.R.E.A.K.S – Preternatural Police the Federal Response to Extra-Sensory and Kindred Supernaturals. But readers don’t need much more than this to sink happily into Harlow’s world and this being a cozy I appreciated that she kept the wider world politics at bay and only focused on the small town of Goodnight. I also appreciated that while there is mention (and brief introduction) of some vampire characters, Harlow doesn’t feel the need to reel them all out in this first book – instead we’re focused mostly on the witch coven, and minimally on the werewolf pack. I liked that Harlow left breadcrumbs concerning other supernaturals that I'd be interested to meet in future books. . .

The big ‘plus’ in this book for me, was the romance. It’s delicious and slow to unfold – but once things heat up, Harlow definitely delivers on the blushes. And, actually, the build-up of the romance is the best part – because there’s a little bit of mystery surrounding the ‘will-they-or-won’t-they?’

Now, I know that ‘What’s a Witch To Do’ is the first in a new series and it could go one of two ways and I'd still be back for the sequel – either the series focuses entirely on Mona, or those other supernaturals of Goodnight each get a turn in the spotlight. Personally, I’m rooting for a Mona-centric series, particularly because there are some interesting background hints concerning Sophie and Cora that I'd be interested to follow up with. But mostly I'd like to stick with Cora because the romance finishes in a very interesting place by book’s end – and I'd love to know what happens next.

He takes a deep breath to regain his composure. “Look, I know you’re used to doing everything on your own, but you cannot do this alone. You can’t. So, I am here to protect you and those girls so you don’t have to. But to do that, we all need to be here. Together. A cohesive unit working together. A pack, okay? And since you aren’t thinking clearly right now, I’ll do it for you. If you die, who will take care of them? They need to be near you, a strong you. If they go away, and you die, they will never ever recover. They have lost too damn much already.”

If there was any part of the novel that faltered for me, it was when the mystery heated up towards the end and takes a violent, deadly turn . . . something happens during Mona’s investigations that reveals a huge betrayal and puts her in immediate danger. But the fallout from this situation did not ring true to me. Actually, after this awful thing happens, Debbie’s wedding goes on as planned the very next day – and that was the only moment that Harlow made me pause and think “huh?” Because she’d set Mona up as this person who feels deeply and for so many people, I just wasn’t buying that she would carry on as planned after this awful thing happens. But that was, honestly, a relatively small blip in a book of awesome.

‘What’s a Witch to Do?’ has rekindled my love of the cozy paranormal mystery. I can't wait to read more books in the 'Midnight Magic Mystery' series, because I am completely, 100% in Mona McGregor’s corner and I desperately want to return to Goodnight, Virginia and further explore this fantastical, magical world that Jennifer Harlow has created. She’s as cozy-good as Charlaine Harris, but with a witchy flair that’s all her own. Superb, and I want more!

4.5/5