Book Review: Breaking Connections, by Albert Wendt

Available now in bookshops nationwide. 

I really enjoyed reading this new novel from Albert Wendt. It’s set mostly in New Zealand, and of course is steeped in Samoan and Maori references.

Daniel, the main character, is a university lecturer and poet. As a child, his Samoan parents moved to NZ so that Daniel could be successful – his mother was particular that he should be competent and comfortable in the palagi system, and she used every means she had including a remarkable acting ability, to make him do as she wished. She had largely turned her back on Samoa, although the family values remained strong.

At school, Daniel forms strong and lasting friendships with a disparate group of kids from other Maori and Pacific backgrounds. The Tribe are family, whanau, aiga to one another and remain loyal despite their differences

By university days, the Tribe is still together and the deliberate inclusion of Laura ( a pakeha) by Mere startles them for a time, but Mere is determined to have her friend be part of the Tribe and Laura is accepted. The connection which forms between Laura and Daniel is too strong for them to ignore – although they try! – and they marry. As things go, eventually they split up and Daniel ends up teaching in Hawaii, which is where the novel starts. Wendt then fills in the backstory.

The connections are many, varied and fascinating. They are made and broken inside and between families and family members, in relationships and marriages – but throughout the connections between members of the Tribe are maintained. Even though all of them are aware of Aaron’s criminal connections, they are never spoken about.

The novel deals powerfully with loyalty, love, and relationships. Wendt shows the great force of human emotion – damaging, dangerous, resilient, passionate, supportive – and just how difficult it can be to face up to unpleasant realities in ourselves and others. He is a superb storyteller and I found myself carried along with the characters, by turns truly irritated with Daniel, sorry for his father, angry with Aaron, in awe of Mere and Laura – in short, I was captivated and could not put this book down.

Read it!

Reviewed by Sue Esterman

Breaking Connections
by Albert Wendt
Published by Huia Publishers
ISBN 9781775502104

Book Review: Out of the Vaipe, the Deadwater – A Writer’s Early Life, by Albert Wendt

Available in bookshops nationwide.

A short and concise history of the very early life of Albert Wendt, Out of the Vaipe, the Deadwater gives the reader a great insight into boyhood split between Samoa and New Zealand.

The first chapter poses an interesting question – how reliable is an autobiography? Wendt acknowledges and defiantly states “Don’t trust me, be suspicious. I’m deliberately leaving out most of the story – it’s none of your business, and I don’t want to hurt the people I love.” I found this simply wonderful – for the author to say from the get-go, “it’s not the whole story and don’t expect it” is rare these days, and I took the rest of the book with a pinch of salt.

Covering his early life in Samoa and scholarship to New Zealand, Wendt pays homage to teachers and places that influenced his life and his writing. At New Plymouth Boys’ High School he published poems for the first time, and wrote and published more during his time at Ardmore Teachers’ College. The Wendt the world reads and enjoys would not exist without the New Zealand education he worked so hard to gain a scholarship for.

The suburb of Apia, Samoa where Albert Wendt spent his boyhood is something of a myth to Wendt now – “Is the Vaipe I’ve created in my stories, poetry and novels really the Vaipe that existed and exists in real life? Or is it real only in my books? Where does fact end and fiction begin?” I feel that this is probably true of many hometowns for people – while we’re not all writers, we sometimes morph and create a place different to remember than the one we actually grew up in. Wendt has immortalised his own upbringing through his writing, excerpts of which are scattered perfectly throughout the book.

On top of this, Wendt has delved in to deeply personal matters – a near death experience in the swimming pool, intense exam stress, severe home sickness in a foreign land very far from home, a mother’s death at a young age,and the somewhat reluctant acceptance of the Maualaivao title.

The uncertainty of the truth to this account didn’t diminish my enjoyment for Wendt’s story; I love a good life story, even if I don’t see the whole picture. There is so much heart thrown in to the pages, and every reader will take something away from such a well-written and informative tale.

Reviewed by Kimaya McIntosh

Out of the Vaipe, the Deadwater – A Writer’s Early Life
by Albert Wendt
Published by BWB Texts
ISBN 9780908321223