
Ngaio Press
39 Dublin Street, Martinborough
New Zealand
(Postal address:
PO Box 153, Martinborough 5741, NZ)
Phone:
+64-6-306 8502
90-year old advice to authors by
Sir Allen Unwin
Click
the ship to access our database of ships and their passengers
which arrived at Port Chalmers in the first four years of the Otago
Settlement, between 1848 and 1851.
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ABOUT US
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Ngaio
Press is a boutique publisher specialising in quality
books about New Zealand and New Zealanders. Our titles
are available in good book stores and direct from our
office in Martinbrough. We also mail books within New
Zealand and overseas. To find out more,
including prices and how to order, click on the
links or book covers below:
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LATEST BOOKS
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FROM
THE BANDSTAND
Wellington
pianist/trumpet player Kevin Clark looks
back over 65 years to the changing and
sometimes bizarre worlds of jazz, dancebands,
composing, recording, broadcasting and
musical academia. A valuable contribution to
Kiwi cultural history that chronicles
cultural shifts in our social history
including the end of the six o'clock swill,
the rise and fall of booze barns and dine &
dance, and the decline of community hall 'socials'
with their kegs of beer, plates of savs and
raffle draws.
ROAD
FROM ROSEHALL
Mike Munro’s semi-fictional account
of the 1850s emigration adventures of a
young Scottish Highlander who quits an
impoverished rural croft to seek his fortune
on the Victorian goldfields, before settling
in New Zealand. Extensively researched, this
novel combines real-life with the flavour of
Scottish emigration to Downunder – the
anguish, the hopes, the dread and the
excitement.
WHEY TO GO
The development
of whey protein concentrate is New Zealand's
biggest waste to riches success story.
Beginning in the early 1970s, we led the
world in the magical new technology of dairy
ultrafiltration to turn huge amounts of
surplus whey byproduct from casein and
cheese plants into specialised, highly
tailored and valuable food ingredients.
Written by the scientists, technologists and
marketers who pioneered the revolution, it
is a fascinating story about how industrial
innovation really works in practice.
A
VICTORIAN LADY'S JOURNEY TO NEW ZEALAND
Jane Wheeler, from
rural Western Australia, went on a voyage of
discovery in 1901, when she sailed with her
husband and sister from Fremantle to
Auckland, then travelled south to Rotorua
and the thermal wonderland. Along the way,
Jane kept an extensive and literate travel
journal in which she described the voyage,
the stopovers in Melbourne and Sydney, and
her experiences of what was them known as
Maoriland. She makes keen observations on
Rotorua's natural wonders and the local
Maori.
GOING
ABROAD (NOW
IN THIRD PRINTING)
Illustrated social history about early
migrants to the Free Church of Scotland
settlement in Otago, NZ, in the mid 19th
century. Going Abroad has become a
standard reference for people
researching their roots in Otago and
Southland, plus the life they left behind in
Scotland and the nature of sailing ship voyages
to the ends of the earth.
ONLY A HANDFUL LEFT
PIANO
IN THE PARLOUR
Pianos
were in huge numbers of New Zealand front parlours
through Victorian and Edwardian times and
into the 1920s. Central to home and
community entertainment, they also stoked
the flames of love for courting couples.
Written by historian and musician John
MacGibbon, Piano in the Parlour is a richly illustrated social
history that looks affectionately at a
time when pianos were the home entertainment
system and most cherished
domestic possession in New Zealand and many
other countries. The book includes words and
music for 17 typical
parlour songs.
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LAST
SHEPHERD Anecdotes and observations
from five decades in the wool industry by
former Wool Board chief executive Roger
Buchanan. Roger worked in many parts of the
industry from wool scouring to international
marketing and negotiating as a senior executive
in wool grower organisations. He offers
penetrating analysis of wool’s rise and
fall, and vividly describes highs, lows and
fascinating incidents from his experiences
in China, Japan, South Asia, Russia, UK,
Europe and the Middle East.
MEET
ME AT BEGG'S,
by historian Clare Gleeson, tells the story
of Charles Begg & Co Ltd, or Begg’s as it
was better known. Founded in 1861 and
trading until 1970, Begg's had branches in
most New Zealand towns and cities.
Synonymous with music, the company retailed
and manufactured instruments, published
sheet music, promoted overseas artists and
supported music in all its facets. It
brought overseas innovations and technology
to New Zealand by way of gramophones,
radios, televisions and a myriad of other
electrical appliances. One of the New
Zealand's liveliest and best illustrated
business histories.
DESERT
SURGEONS New Zealand's
Mobile Surgical Unit in the Western Desert
in World War II brought treatment of the
injured right up near the battle front,
pioneering ideas that were taken up by field
medical units in other Allied armies. And
they got into some dramatic scrapes with
Rommel's troops, who held them in high
regard. Researched and written by Michael
Shackleton, a surgeon himself, who did
similar work in Vietnam.
PLAYING
AGAINST THE WIND
Besieged by communists and vampires;
apprehensive about the Bomb and the Cold
War; in constant trepidation that his family
was about to implode; and trying to prepare
himself for sporting glory on a postage
stamp of backyard grass, Neville Martin’s
Wellington childhood and adolescence was
never going to be an easy ride. Playing against the Wind provides a
glimpse of a Wellington (and a world) long
gone. The stories are at once nostalgic,
sometimes touching – but above all, funny.
SOLD OUT
FOR
THE DURATION
Lt Bruce
Robertson left in January 1940 with the
first echelon of Kiwi volunteers and served
in Egypt, Libya and Syria before being
captured at El Alamein. He endured prison
camps in Italy and Germany before being
liberated by the Americans in April 1945.
Robertson wrote it down with great skill
when it happened and his diaries and
notebooks have now been transcribed and
illustrated. One of the more
perceptive personal accounts of Kiwi service
in World War II, from both active service
and POW points of view.
YOUR
FAMILY'S HISTORY: research, write and
publish it. Expanded from lectures given
by John MacGibbon at the National Library of
New Zealand and Otago University. A great starter for new
researchers, and valuable advice and
information for people who want to move to
the next stage: writing and publishing their
family's story. Third revised edition.
KHAKI
ANGELS
While others dived for cover, the
bravest of the brave went in.
Brendan O’Carroll’s new book pays tribute to
the courageous ‘Khaki Angels’:
stretcher-bearers and other Kiwi frontline
medical people who put others before self in
two world wars, serving in Gallipoli,
Europe, North Africa, Greece, Italy and the
Pacific. Khaki Angels also looks at
general wartime medical matters: field
organisation, what caused death and
injuries, what the injuries were like and
how they were treated.
... and we meet some heroes.
MAORILAND STORIES
First
published in 1895, these short stories were
written by Alfred Grace, a member of the
celebrated Maoriland School of Writing that
flourished between 1896 and 1915. These
writers'
romantic treatment of the Maori people
helped shape New Zealand’s culture in the
early twentieth century. This near-facsimile
edition includes an extended essay by Dr
Anne Maxwell which discusses the author and
his stories, placing them in their
historical and cultural context.
SOLD OUT
SHEPHERD'S
PROGRESS
Scottish shepherds and their border collies
are woven into the legend of New Zealand’s
high country sheep stations. James Elliot
was one of these and he ended up managing a
large group of sheep runs in Central Otago
for New Zealand's great Victorian and
Edwardian mercantile partnership, Ross &
Glendining. A profusely illustrated book
that is part family history, part farming
history and part social history.
SOLD OUT
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ALL
FORMED UP
The story of Wellington Returned and
Services’ Association (RSA) from its
beginnings in 1916 until 2007. Of the many
RSAs in New Zealand towns and cities,
Wellington has been the most broadly
influential because its capital city
location meant it worked closely with the
national organisation. Until a history of
NZRSA is published, this is de facto
a history of the RSA in New Zealand.
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JAYCEE
In its heyday, Jaycee was one of New
Zealand’s liveliest service organisations
and contributed greatly to our social
infrastructure. Every community has
amenities built or aided by the Jaycees and
they also trained leaders for roles in
politics, local government and business.
This readable and well-illustrated book
remembers the fun times and the more serious
times, while making an important
contribution to New Zealand history and the
international study of service
organisations. |
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BARCE
RAID
The
famous and exciting Long Range Desert Group
raid on Barce airfield and town in WWII,
from both Allied and Italian sides in the
action. Written by foremost LRDG authority
Brendan O'Carroll, this full-colour, heavily
illustrated hardback will enthrall general
readers and Special Forces enthusiasts
alike.
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OTHER GREAT
TITLES STILL IN PRINT
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A
DRIVEN MAN
Missionary Thomas Grace in New Zealand,
1850-1879: controversy, danger, and battling
for Maori causes. New Zealand at the time of
the Land Wars, through the eyes of a
fearless critic – an important information
source for anyone interested in interactions
between settlers and tangata whenua.
SOLD OUT
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BEARDED BRIGANDS
The legendary Long Range Desert
Group in North Africa during World
War II, in the celebrated
diaries & photos of Trooper Frank Jopling.
Only a handful
left
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WOOL:
A history of New Zealand's wool industry
The definitive story by Bill Carter & John
MacGibbon of New Zealand's sheep and wool
industry from colonial times to the present
day. A major work of New Zealand history.
STRUAN'S
WAR
WWII battles, recreation and
sightseeing in North Africa and Palestine – photos and
diaries of a New Zealand Division gunner who
was as talented with his camera as he was with
his pen.
THE
MAGIC HOUR
John Giacon,
prolific magazine writer and one of New
Zealand fishing's great raconteurs, shares a
lifetime's experience in the sport in one of
the most charming fishing books of recent
years.
SOLD OUT
UP
THE BLUE
North Africa and Italy in
WWII: Roger Smith's Kiwi
classic about the people,
the places, the fighting and
the psychology.
CHRISTINA'S
STORY
Life in the New
Hebrides as a New
Zealand Presbyterian
missionary's wife,
1938-1956. NOT a
tale of piety and
conversion. SOLD OUT |
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