Books of the week
Half Wild by Pip Smith (Allen and Unwin) $33
I don’t look at the blurbs of books I’m reviewing until after I’ve finished reading them, because I want the book to unfold with only the information the author wants me to have. For Half Wild, this was a good decision; and I recommend this strategy. But it leaves me with the problem of how not to give the game away.
So let me try this: Half Wild is Australian author Pip Smith’s first novel. It is set in Australia and Aotearoa a century or so ago, and contains some seriously excellent writing: ‘‘She’d look at you with her eyes all misted over, as if someone was having a bath inside her head.’’
Tally Ho, known to her parents as Nina, is a young Kiwi-italian tomboy in Wellington in the late 19th century. She skips school to run wild with her friends, rebelling against the gendered expectations of girls: ‘‘Everything was tiny and breakable, because being a lady was about not breaking things, and the winner was the person who couldn’t break the tiniest thing.’’
Smith is also a poet, bookseller, songwriter, and actor; and you can feel these roles in her writing. She poses and then evades questions of what ‘really’ happened and who people ‘really’ are: ‘‘ ‘the truth’ was a room with the blinds down and the lights out. You could only see if you pulled the blinds up… but then… It would become something else entirely.’’
At around the halfway mark my interest began to wane as the story wandered too far away from the main characters. But its central conceit – which I’m tying myself in knots to not spoil here – is strong enough, and Smith’s writing is consistently skilful that the reader’s effort is rewarded.
– Elizabeth Heritage
Junk Food Japan: Addictive Food from Kurobuta by Scott Hallsworth (Bloomsbury) $53
When Hallsworth’s first Kurobuta pop-up came to my native London it quickly became my favourite post-payday haunt for its instantly recognisable, authentic Japanese comfort food with a bold, brazen twist. Here the Australian chef continues to showcase his encyclopaedic knowledge of the cuisine and penchant for bending the rules. A classic curry calls for ribs instead of poultry; the humble chicken katsu is extravagantly topped with an umami-overloaded French butter; raw tuna meets truffle oil and tortilla in his famous sashimi pizza.
Everything about this book is passionate, playful and intense. Laugh-out-loud anecdotes and educational facts headline each recipe (often accompanied with a liberal sprinkling of the f-word).
However, this book demands commitment. Many recipes are quite time-consuming and require a certain degree of skill. Be ready to make a lot of condiments and remember that getting hold of exotic ingredients might prove tricky. But, for adventurous Japanese fusion aficionados, it’s totally worth it. – Janan Jay