Kataraina

In Auē eight-year-old Ārama was taken by his brother, Taukiri, to live with Kat and Stu at the farm in Kaikōura, setting in train the tragedy that unfolded. Ārama’s aunty Kat was at the centre of events, but silenced by abuse her voice was absent from the story.

In Kataraina, Kat and her whānau take over the telling. As one, they return to her childhood and the time when she first began to feel the greenness of the swamp in her veins – the swamp that holds her tears and the tears of her tīpuna, the swamp on the land owned by Stu that has been growing since the girl shot the man.

Becky Manawatu’s new novel is the much-awaited sequel to award-winning bestseller Auē and is unflinching in its portrayal of the destructive ways people love one another and the ancestral whenua on which they stand.

Author Biography

Becky Manawatu (Ngāi
Tahu, Ngāti Māmoe,
Waitaha) is a West Coast
author and journalist. She
was born in Nelson and
grew up in Waimangaroa,
living now in Westport
with her family. Her
debut novel, Auē, won
Aotearoa’s leading fiction
prizes and became one
of the country’s all-time
fiction bestsellers.