THE PENGUIN NEW ZEALAND ANTHOLOGY
edited by Harriet Allan
(Penguin Random House NZ, $45 hb)
“Best story set in another country: Paula Morris’s False River, entwining a marriage breakup with Hurricane Katrina.
Short stories have always been a mainstay of New Zealand literature, from the short-form icon Katherine Mansfield through the years of Frank Sargeson, Dan Davin, Maurice Duggan and others. Many anthologies have charted the progress of New Zealand short stories. is a little different. Penguin NZ is celebrating its 50th anniversary of(published 1973), a short poetic vignette about a family who have to leave their tūrangawaewae. We end with Evana Belich’s gutsy story (2023), about employment negotiations in a retirement home. Belich, a steadfast unionist, is one of the few current writers with the nous to take labour disputes as worthy of examination in literature.
