As part of the nationwide KiwiReads March promotion of
independent publishing, author David McGill (left) is one of the guest speakers at the
Kapiti Friends of the Library launch of Mercedes Webb-Pullman’s latest poetry
collection
Bravo Charlie Foxtrot at Paraparaumu
Library on Thursday March 20.
McGill will talk about his about
independent publishing and new novel.
His first publication was the prose and poem collection Miscellany in 1961, which he wrote,
edited, printed and sold on the streets of Wellington, breaking even on an
outlay of £30 to the printer John Milne. Two decades later he again had John
Milne print his Wellington heritage vignettes Harbourscapes, with illustrations by Grant Tilly.
In the early
nineties he got serious about publishing full-time when he was told by the
Customs Department that his commissioned history of the department could not
legally be published by them. Subsequently his Silver Owl Press has published
24 of his works of fiction and non-fiction Kiwi social history, supplemented by
publishing at requests of other authors a war story, a novel, a collection of
short stories, a memoir, most recently Tony Simpson’s Ambiguity and Innocence, the history
of Kiwis and other occupying forces in Trieste.
His own books include the
history of Somes/Matiu Island, Island of
Secrets, a memoir I Almost Tackled
Kel Tremain, a biography of criminal lawyer Stacey, A Dictionary of Noughties Kiwi Slang, fictional autobiography Shaking 1960 and The Mock Funeral: A novel of the Irish Riots on the Goldfields of New
Zealand. His 50 books are on his website www.davidmcgill.co.nz.
Stamp in the Creek
recreates those uncomplicated post-war years when you bought threepenny stamps
and children collected them when they were not playing marbles and kingaseeny,
raiding orchards, having shanghai fights and swimming unsupervised in lagoons
and creeks.
Good and bad news was delivered by telegram and people shared party
lines, some eavesdropping. Ladies baked and men said blimmin, ruddy and flippin
heck.
Men wore hats and drank beer ponies in the pub and quarts at home, ladies
sported fox furs and drank sherry. Men still had nightmares from the war, went
hunting, shooting and fishing, rated their wrestler Lofty Blomfield and world
billiards champion Clark McConachy, the boys wanted to be Errol Flynn or the
Lone Ranger.
The Easter gymkhana featured dog trials, buck-jumping events, baby
shows and cake stalls. The circus came to town with its trick cyclists and
lions and monkeys and whip-cracking displays. Bing Crosby had a big hit on
radio and 78 rpm record with ‘Now Is the Hour’, described as ‘Maori Farewell
Song’, singing cowboy Gene Autry was bigger with ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed
Reindeer’, but top of the 1949 charts was Vaughn Monroe’s ‘Ghost Riders in the
Sky’.
And in the sleepy village of Kotuku the young postmaster has his office
safe stolen and his son kidnapped by outsiders after a valuable stamp. The
village gets in behind against those who employ car conversion, stand-over
tactics, blackmail and whatever it takes to get the stamp. The politicians and
post office hierarchy are more concerned about a public service scandal in
election year.
You are cordially invited to the launch of
Stamp in the Creek
the concluding comic novel in the Cavanagh family trilogy
set in the fictional version of the author’s hometown of
Matata
Paekakariki
Railway Museum Tearooms, Saturday, April 12, 3pm
Musician Francis
Mills gives the premiere performance of Michael O’Leary’s poem Matata.
The author
talks (briefly) about the uncomplicated post-war life in which his novel is
set, about the three eras of Kiwi slang depicted in his trilogy, a way of
putting flesh on the bones of his six best-selling collections of Kiwi slang.
Firstly there is the 1980s gold fever of Gold
in the Creek, followed by the contemporary tourist boosterism of Geyser in the Creek, and finally 1949,
when Stamp in the Creek involves the theft
of a valuable stamp leading to kidnap, arson, blackmail, stand-over tactics,
car conversion and the worst fears of police and post office hierarchy of
another national scandal only a week after the infamous 1ZB April Fool report
of a mile-wide wasp swarm descending on Auckland. Truth newspaper obliges establishment fears.
Gold in the Creek: ‘A veritable Milkwood of characters. A bit of a dag.’ NZ Listener
Traditional
Kiwi tucker will be served with tea plus. Post-war memorabilia on display.
The book is
retail $29-95, launch discount price $20.
Trilogy e-books $9.95 each from www.mebooks.co.nz
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