We recently enjoyed an interesting and engaging session with award-winning Aotearoa author/illustrator extraordinaire Ruth Paul, in which she shared many fascinating insights gleaned from her celebrated career as an author and illustrator. She took us on a short virtual tour showing her semi-rural Wellington farmhouse, studio and ever-expanding area of native bush which has recently become home to around a dozen relocated kiwi! (Ruth explained her participation in the Government’s emissions trading scheme helps to supplement her book-industry income.) After starting out illustrating three picture books written by others, Ruth has since worked exclusively on books she both writes and illustrates and now has more than 24 of these picture books to her credit. Ruth's titles have been published in New Zealand, Australia, USA, Canada, the UK, China and Korea, with translations in five languages. We heard about some of the books she has coming out this year, including fiction pictur...

Deborah Hinde works from her home based studio in rural Waikato. Her studio is a converted double garage not far from the house, with garden and rolling countryside views. Pheasants, hares, hedgehogs and rabbits, plus a multitude of birds are often seen enjoying the garden. Her surroundings often provide great inspiration for some of her characters. Deborah is the illustrator of more than 100 books, both fiction and non-fiction, with over 45 of these picture books. Her illustrations for  The Spaghetti Giraffe  (Flat Bed Press) was awarded the 2018 Storylines Notable Book Award (and more recently in 2023,  A Kiwi Night Before Christmas  (Scholastic NZ), the first book she ever illustrated, received the Gaelyn Gordon Award for a well-loved book.  In 2016 Deborah ventured into independent publishing with  Hare.  Since then she’s produced another 5 books working on her own text as well as bringing other authors stories to life. She illustrated and pro...

One of the hardest things about writing is maintaining focus. It seems the writers who have no trouble with this also often have no other job. Or they are so committed to their novel that they get up an hour earlier to write – every day. The rest of us continue to struggle. We have to work at jobs we usually don’t enjoy much for 7-10 hours every day, we have family to spend quality time with, chores, bills to pay… The time for working on our novels gets squeezed from every direction and it’s hard to find the time and energy to write. That’s why writing retreats are so beneficial - and often downright amazing. Not just because you have a week or a month (or perhaps three months if you are lucky) to do nothing but focus on your novel and write. But because of what it creates for you in other ways. A writing retreat is the perfect opportunity to grow your writing, and to grow as a writer and learn what that means for you. Time There are 24 hours in a day. You might spend 8 of those sleepi...

Samantha is a children’s author and poet from Ōtepoti, and is the 2025 Otago University College of Education Children’s Writer in Residence. She has written numerous titles for Wendy Pye Publishing NZ, Harper Collins UK, Hodder & Stoughton UK, Red Rocket Readers and the Ministry of Education. Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary journals and publications.  What is your writing day like? When and how do you create? It always starts with words on the page. Sometimes that’s meeting a target for a work in progress, other times it might be writing fragments of an idea for a project to come. I am most happy in my office, at home with my coffee pot, cat and favourite books around me. But I can write from anywhere - like most writers, another job and family life often means a notebook on the run works just as well.  At the moment, I am living the dream! The writing fellowship allows me to immerse myself into my writing project in a way that feels deliciously extravaga...

  The Publishing Landscape Is Always Changing An opinion piece For those of you keeping a finger on the pulse of publishing, you may have heard the most recent news about Text Publishing being bought by Penguin RandomHouse in Australia. Although the news was released officially, most authors would have found out via social media, but I imagine those published by Text would have been told earlier in an email (that’s what usually happens). As several people commented, this possibly explains why the Text Prize for YA and MG books was cancelled. For NZ authors, you may think this news isn’t really relevant, but it’s the kind of thing that does reverberate across the ‘ditch’, not least because Text had a specifically NZ prize, too. But it doesn’t stop there. In the past six months, two other significant independent publishers have also been sold. Affirm Press (who are highly regarded for their picture book publishing, among other things) were bought by Simon & Schuster, and Pantera ...

I’m Elena — I live in Tāmaki Makaurau, have three grown up children and began writing when they were at school. I’ve written readers, short stories, plays, junior fiction, stories in verse and poetic picture books but I always come back to poetry as my happy place.    What is your writing day like? When and how do you create? I’m a life-long procrastinator and bit of a night ruru – I always get a second wind around 4-5pm and find I’m at my most creative from then until around midnight. Often that schedule’s not really practical, so mostly I’ll settle down after lunch to write.  I’m making it sound like I actually have a routine but really every writing day is different for me and, especially with poems, most of the early creation happens in my head when I’m walking or in the shower (not good for the water bill).  And if there’s an idea I’m really excited about or a deadline to meet then I suddenly find I can write at any time of the day – funny that!  Here’s a p...