A wonderfully surprising, inventive and deeply moving riff on fact and fiction, history and imagination from one of New Zealand's finest and most memorable storytellers. There has never been a New Zealand novel quite like The Parihaka Woman. Richly imaginative and original, weaving together fact and fiction, it sets the remarkable story of Erenora against the historical background of the turbulent and compelling events that occurred in Parihaka during the 1870s and 1880s.

Hina, the Maori moon goddess, has 30 different faces to help illuminate life’s lessons—a different face and a different energy for each day of the month. And with her changing light, new insights are revealed. This book gives us the chance to connect to the ancient wisdom of the old people, who reach forward into our lives, with each of the moon’s names as their offerings. Their reminders are a source of strength in our strange modern world, where we have been stripped of much of the connection and relationships we need for our wellbeing through successive lockdowns.

Tiki is a God who in the dim long ago helped to build the world, and the whose carved image is now supporting the middle pillar of the house. His eyes of pawa-shell, which once commanded in the Ten Heavens and were full of fire and wisdom, glisten out of the silent twilight; they stare far, far into the Darkness, which Hine-nui-te-po is slowly spreading over the world; Hine-nui-te-po, the Great Mother of Night, who at one time was young and beautiful, and gave Life to Nature.

Wearing the colour red and having the patch with the emblem of the mighty bulldog on your back was what ex-Mongrel Mob leader Tuhoe 'Bruno' Isaac called being True Red. "Because all levels of society hated us we created a new society of hatred symbolised by the bulldog. Its ferocious habits were engraved on our hearts", Tuhoe says, "If you weren't a mobster you weren't worth knowing." He lived this way for 17 years. However, constantly living for the bash, beer, prison and the possibility of dying in a pool of blood eventually saw Tuhoe search for another way of doing life.

In this beautiful and transformative book, 24 Māori academics share their personal journeys, revealing what being Māori has meant for them in their work. Their perspectives provide insight for all New Zealanders into how mātauranga is positively influencing the Western-dominated disciplines of knowledge in the research sector. It is a shameful fact, says co-editor Jacinta Ruru in her introduction to Nga Kete Mātauranga, that in 2020, only about five percent of academic staff at universities in Aotearoa New Zealand are Māori.