7 books by Shonagh Koea
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Overview: Shonagh Koea has written three short-story collections as well as seven novels and a memoir. Of the novels, Sing to Me, Dreamer became a finalist in the New Zealand Book Awards (1995) and The Lonely Margins of the Sea was judged runner-up for the Deutz Medal for Fiction (1999). Shonagh Koea has also held the University of Auckland Fellowship in Literature (1993) and the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship (1997).
Genre: Contemporary Fiction | New Zealand
Staying Home and Being Rotten
This novel is a compelling, black comedy of manners and relationships.When the parcel first reaches Rosalind’s mail box she is unable to take it out or even to contemplate opening it. It throws her into a series of painful recollections and comic-tragic events, which gradually reveal the nature of the unfortunate experience she has undergone, and eventually leads to an unexpected and, for the reader, superbly satisfying resolution of her pain and distress.The novel combines the robust good humour of Henry Fielding, with the sensitivities of Jane Austen and the satirical playfulness of Evelyn Waugh. This delightful combination produces a black comedy of manners, which, once taken up, can’t be put down.
Sing to Me, Dreamer
A quirky, much-loved novel about a return home, a past love affair and an elephant."It is many years since I turned the pages of the little book I wrote for the holy man, and the ivory covers creak as I open on the story of how I went to India . . . As my voice ascends, thin as the song of a lark, I see again the black eyes of the holy man, irises flecked with gold as he hands me the pen and paper. ‘Oh sing to me, dreamer,’ he said, and I began to write." Back home as she sorts out her deceased Mother’s estate, Margaret Harris reflects on her time in India as mistress to a Maharajah. But there are many things that she has to confront in the present – her bullying lawyer, the aggressive neighbour, and the spectre of her failed relationship with her mother.
The Wedding At Bueno-Vista
Wry and poignant, this quirky novel is about resilience and defiance in the face of loss. "Dear Invisible Elaine, I know you are out there somewhere, but it would be really wonderful if I could find you." The Wedding at Bueno-Vista takes us into the world of Elaine Frobisher, a woman who makes herself invisible to those who wish her well, but too visible and vulnerable to those who wish her ill, such predators as the lecherous Adrian Bunce or the burglars who watch her house then steal her possessions and sense of security. Recently widowed and feeling terrorised, she flees to an anonymous apartment block and, for protection, sets about inventing a marriage with an imaginary husband.
The Lonely Margins of the Sea
Witty and ironic, this novel follows an intriguing return to the family home on the lonely margins of the sea.Stephanie was always the outsider – never allowed to play with the china dolls on the staircase landing, always on the edge of family events, shut out of the important secrets. Now, after many years, she returns to the family house, on the lonely margins of the sea, to care for her cousin Louise. But now it is her immediate past, too, that haunts her – the time she has spent locked away for a crime she dare not recall. With consummate skill, insight and poignancy, Shonagh Koea weaves her magic once again in this memorable novel.
Yet Another Ghastly Christmas
Witty and poignant, wicked and touching, another entertaining novel from popular writer Shonagh Koea.As Christmas approaches, Evelyn’s ‘friends’ the Clarks become more and more anxious about where she is going to spend Christmas, or more precisely with whom. They push forward a worrying assortment of candidates in an effort to ensure it’s not with them. Evelyn would rather they just left her alone to let her get on with tending her sparse garden and reading her novel about the soldier who killed himself. His fate starts to be a tempting option to the ceaseless phone calls from Jennifer Clark badgering her to find someone.As yet another Christmas draws near, showing all the signs of being ghastly, what can Evelyn do?
Landscape with Solitary Figure
A novel about the transporting power of the imagination, about overcoming violence, and about the beauty and resilience of a solitary life.Ellis has come to appreciate her solitary life, in her bungalow not far from the sea. As she looks from her window, she begins to find a way to confront and yet distance the past. Gradually, she edges towards and away from the time she moved to another town, the one she subsequently fled from.It was in this town that she met the man who invited her to his dinner parties and who took particular interest in knowing her biggest fear. In revealing what he did to her, Ellis also describes how she survived . . .Written in Shonagh Koea’s distinctive style, this compelling novel is at times darkly humorous but also deeply unsettling.
Rain
Shonagh Koea exhibits her wonderful ability to combine the wry with the poignant in this finely observed short story.When asked which was her daughter, Alyssum’s mother always used to say, ‘The ugly one.’ Alyssum has since made a life for herself, away from her old home. But her mother is now in hospital, suffering from dementia. Can Alyssum reach through the pain of the past or will her mother have the last word?Funny, touching, painful, this is quintessential Koea territory.
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