October 2022

In the tender, beautifully told The 10pm Question, anxious 12-year-old Frankie Parsons has a drumbeat of questions steadily gaining volume in his head. Are the smoke alarm batteries flat? Does the cat, and therefore the rest of the family, have worms? Is the kidney-shaped spot on his chest a galloping cancer? And then there is the […]

Dunedin writer Paddy Richardson enthralled the audience at QWF 2020 when she spoke about crime writing, so we’re absolutely delighted Paddy is returning to the festival in 2022 to speak about another of her passions, historical fiction. Paddy will talk with Arrowtown writer and educator Sue Luus about her latest novel, a work described by

We’re delighted to announce Queenstown Writers Festival’s first official charity partner, Kiwi Christmas Books. We can think of no better way to share our love of story telling and the joy of reading than to get more books into the hands of young New Zealanders. Kiwi Christmas Books provides brand-new books to families who can’t

Whiti Hereaka dressed as a bird to go to the 2022 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. She didn’t expect to win, but was celebrating her novel Kurangaituku being a finalist in the fiction book of the year. But she did win and gave her acceptance speech adorned with wings and feathers. “I’m still processing it,” she

If your life smacks of boredom and sameness filled with ordinary people, you need to read Eddy, Eddy. I wanted to invite these characters to a dinner party and, although this in itself would be entertaining, adding the animals featured in the story to the guest list would guarantee comic relief. So entirely did the