On Sunday 18 March SpecFicNZ hosted our first NZ Book Month event, ‘Flights of Fancy’, at the Air Force Museum in Christchurch. Seven SpecFicNZ members read excerpts of their writing.
- Jane Higgins read from her YA novel The Bridge
- Amanda Fitzwater read from her story ‘Cartography, and the Death of Shoes’ (published in the anthology Fat Girl in a Strange Land)
- Diane Berry read from Dragons Away!, the humorous fantasy novel written by herself and Kevin Berry
- Jennifer Fallon read from The Immortal Prince
- Liz Gatens read her short story ‘The Glitch Doctor’ (published at Shades of Sentience)
- Paul Mannering read his short story ‘The Shrieking Woman’ (published in the anthology Tales from the Bell Club)
- Helen Lowe read three excerpts, one each from her books Thornspell, The Heir of Night, and The Gathering of the Lost.
All seven readers gave excellent performances and were a joy to listen to.
The audience very much enjoyed the event, and the book table was swamped at the end of the readings.
Thanks go to Paul Mannering for being the MC for the event. He did an outstanding job.
Thanks also go to the NZ Book Month team for being so supportive and so enthusiastic about the event. Their enthusiasm is a promising sign that things are changing for speculative fiction writers in New Zealand; if NZ Book Month’s support is anything to go by, then the industry is starting to recognise the value and variety that we bring to the NZ book publishing industry.
And a very special thanks to Catherine Ford for coming up with the idea and organizing the whole thing.
More photos from the event can be found HERE.