Lotsa books!

It's been a productive few days here at Purua. I have finished a new book, made four copies of an old one, and almost finished two other new ones.

I think the new book is delightful and funny, it makes me laugh out loud when I play with it. It's called Boob Book, and is almost a 5cm cube when closed. Inside each page has a line drawing of a pair of breasts and a different word for breasts. It is bound on two spines, similar to a book called Tumbling Blocks by Claire Van Vliet, so it moves in your hands like a toy. I know/know of so many women who have/have had breast cancer and it's too easy to start thinking of breasts as problem areas. Also in the context of increasingly common cosmetic surgery suggesting that many women are unhappy with their breasts, I wanted to playfully, lightly, happily celebrate this wonderful part of our bodies. I hope this book will appeal to anyone who has/has had/ enjoys/wants breasts. (And watch this space, as I am planning a second breast-themed book called Extravagant Promises).

The old book I have been making up today is Houghton Bay, about surfers in Cook Strait. It's a little book that I'm hoping will go well at the Artisan's Fair this weekend. 18cm x 2.5cm, the cover is shiny blue, the end papers silver, and the accoridian fold pages are printed on tracing paper so the punchline of the poem is almost visible as a misty hint before you get to the end.

The two almost finished new books are both part of the bush book series: Waitawheta Valley and Wairere Falls. They are both about walks in the Kaimai mountain range that runs between the Hauraki Plains and the Bay of Plenty. The insides are all done, I just need to do the covers.

I'm sorry I can't post any photos yet (any reader who gives me a digital camera will get lots of lovely free books!) but Katrina Ching, who took many of the beautiful photos on my website, is going to get all my books on film when I am in Wellington in a fortnight- soon after that I will update the galleries on my website with all the new pictures.