Book Review: Hudson & Halls, the Food of Love, by Joanne Drayton

Available in bookshops nationwide. This book is shortlisted for the Royal Society Te Apārangi Award for General Non-fiction in the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards 

Hudson & Halls, The Food of Love is a wonderful book. Far more interesting than just their cooking, this tells the story of their two lives – in the spotlight, and in private.

Drayton has done a great job of researching their backgrounds and giving an insight into their personalities. While their television personas were very flamboyant and upbeat, their personal lives contained a lot of sadness. Peter Hudson grew up not really knowing who his real mother (whose background could be a whole book in itself) was, while David Halls pretty much knew who he was – but subconsciously realised it wasn’t what his family would accept.

The fact they came from opposite sides of the world and from very different backgrounds meant nothing once they met – it was like they found their soulmates and their purpose in life. I’m still a little astounded a shoe salesman and a shipping clerk ended up being celebrity chefs, but hey, this was the 1970s when anyone with ambition could become a star!

The book included a lot of things I never knew about the couple, probably because I was a teenager when they were at the height of their fame here. I didn’t know about their shoe shop or their restaurant, and I’m not even sure I knew about their move to the UK after New Zealand television ended their reign.

As a homosexual couple, Hudson and Halls lived in conservative New Zealand during a time of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’, but they were genuinely liked by many and a lot of homes owned at least one of their cookbooks. Despite this they certainly suffered some harsh criticism both here and in the UK (if the reviewer of one of their television series published her review today, there would be an outcry and she’d be rightly vilified), but they never gave up.

I doubt many people would have kept going despite so many rejections, but reinventing themselves was something Hudson and Halls did time and time again.

While I knew neither man was still alive I did not recall details about their deaths, and reading about what happened deeply saddened me. I always remembered Hudson and Halls and their spats in the kitchen, but Drayton’s book means I will now remember them more fondly, like a pair of slightly eccentric uncles who could always be relied upon to liven up any family gathering.

At the end of the book Drayton shares how long it took her to write the book and how many setbacks she had along the way. I’m very pleased she persevered and made the effort to talk to as many people who knew the couple as possible. I think that is what sets this book apart – the photos are like looking into someone’s personal photo album (which it sounds like she was permitted to do), and the memories of their friends are what elevate it from a mere biography into a very personal look into Hudson and Halls’ lives. I’m sure they’d be horrified at some of the personal recollections of their friends, but the book would be poorer without them. Their friends and family have shared some intimate memories but the book is definitely not voyeuristic.

Reviewed by Faye Lougher

Hudson & Halls, the Food of Love
by Joanne Drayton
Published by Otago University Press
ISBN 9781988531267

Book Review: Drawn Out, by Tom Scott

Available in bookshops nationwide.

Tom Scott is probably better known for being a cartoonist rather than a writer, but his memoir, Drawn Out, proves he’s just as witty with words as he is with pictures.

The book tells the funny, heart-warming and often sad tale of his life and goes some way towards explaining where he got some of the material for his cartoons and plays.

When people say they had a hard time as a child, they probably don’t mean as hard as Scott’s. His father could be cruel and it’s pretty clear Scott wasn’t his favourite child. Cartooning and acting up in class were ways for him to express his feelings, but rather than pursuing any of those creative endeavours he decided to train as a vet. As an animal lover, after reading some of the things he and his mates got up to, I’m glad he gave up on the idea of being a vet!

Drawn Out provides some fascinating insights to major events that happened in New Zealand as Scott illustrated or wrote about most of them. He riled bosses and prime ministers alike (he was famously banned from going on an overseas trip to China by then prime minister Robert Muldoon), but he obviously got on well with many of those he came across in his working life, some of whom became close friends.

Scott has a knack of bringing people to life in his writing. You feel sorry for the cards many of them got dealt – Scott included – and the background he offers helps provide a better understanding of why certain decisions were made. However, some of the anecdotes about people still living do at times come across as a tad gratuitous, as do the snippets of plays and scripts that are dotted here and there.

There is no doubt Scott is a talented writer, but the book could have done with some judicious editing as it wanders and backtracks a bit. He has been there and done that, but it’s a bit hard to keep track of all the people, events and memories. One person is mentioned early on in the book and I hazarded a guess as to who they were, but it wasn’t until page 295 that this was confirmed.

Overall, Drawn Out is a good yarn in the style of Barry Crump. If you’re interested in the people who made the news and the lives of those who reported on them, you’ll enjoy this book.

Reviewed by Faye Lougher

Drawn Out
by Tom Scott
Published by Allen & Unwin
ISBN 9781877505911

Book Review: Back With The Human Condition, by Nick Ascroft

Available in bookshops nationwide.

Much like the author photo proudly displayed on the back cover, Back With The Human Condition presents itself as a serious collection, but one that is filled with slightly more relaxed and satirical moments. At face value the book feels like a philosophical exploration. Love. Money. Death. Complaints. And while the gravity of the first three subjects can weigh heavily, it is the fourth and final, the slight twist, that delights and carries itself throughout the collection.

These four sections act as a guide, a reference point by which we can look into the poems. Through them Ascroft focuses the readers attention in a very effective manner, the subjects are after all relatable to us as readers in some way. And by keeping his overarching subjects so broad, we can read our own experiences into his writing. It is a rare thing for an author to pull this off successfully, but Ascroft has managed it, seemingly with ease.

Reading through the collection, one can see the fine crafting that has gone into each and every poem. In ‘The Tide’ we find a powerful description of a lover’s touch.

Your touch if it was made of notes wouldn’t be in the woodwind from
the bulrushes at your voice’s base, curling up and down your throat
and flowering into tight seedheads of words, but in the syncopation
of high black ticking piano keys, offbeat and ticklish like long grass.

The images conjured by Ascroft’s elegant poetry can instil powerful and relatable emotions in the reader. And while this poem grabbed my attention, each person who picks up this book could find a poem or passage that truly speaks to them, that connects with their own human condition.

On the other side there are poems that border on the satirical, and clever poems whose enjoyment comes from a more simple part of human nature. The poem Subject-Verb Agreement plays around with language on multiple levels, titles like Whereby I Compare You to a Cow and Try to Dig My Way Out, and Jonathan Relieves Himself out a Bus Window in India are enough to illicit a chuckle, and poems like This Poem Is Guaranteed to Awaken a Coma Victim play around with modern conventions. Back With the Human Condition recognises and explores all parts of human nature, providing a varied and enjoyable experience.

But this collection is not just about a connection on a human level. Ascroft ventures beyond this to some degree with poems like The Bearded Blog, an experimental piece that visually emulates a page of web code. This collection about us is not just drawing on our experiences and using those to present itself, but also providing new angles of thought, new avenues to tread down as humans. So in the end, perhaps Ascroft is more philosophical then I thought, though the bathrobe still reminds me of the lighter side of his writing.

Reviewed by Matthias Metzler

Back With The Human Condition
by Nick Ascroft
Published by VUP
ISBN 9781776560844

Reviews of the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards finalists

The finalists in the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards have now been announced, giving readers 16 fine books to take a second look at, and consider among the best New Zealand books ever produced. The judges had an unenviable task, with 18 months worth of submissions considered, and of course they haven’t chosen everybody’s favourite books (wherefore no The Chimes?) , but it is a pretty fine list nonetheless.

Click the title you are interested in below to read a review, either on our blog, or if we haven’t yet had it reviewed, in another extremely reputable place.

Acorn Foundation Literary Award (Fiction) 

Image from Unity Books Wellington @unitybookswgtn

The Back of His Head, by Patrick Evans (Victoria University Press)
Chappy, by Patricia Grace (Penguin Random House)
Coming Rain, by Stephen Daisley (Text Publishing)
The Invisible Mile, by David Coventry (Victoria University Press)

Poetry
How to be Dead in a Year of Snakes, by Chris Tse (Auckland University Press)
The Night We Ate the Baby, by Tim Upperton (Haunui Press)
Song of the Ghost in the Machine, by Roger Horrocks (Victoria University Press)
The Conch Trumpet, by David Eggleton (Otago University Press)

General Non-Fiction

Image from Unity Books Wellington @unitybookswgtn

Maurice Gee: Life and Work, by Rachel Barrowman (Victoria University Press)
The Villa at the Edge of the Empire: One Hundred Ways to Read a City, by Fiona Farrell (Penguin Random House)
Māori Boy: A Memoir of Childhood, by Witi Ihimaera (Penguin Random House)
Lost and Gone Away, by Lynn Jenner (Auckland University Press)

Illustrated Non-Fiction
Te Ara Puoro: A Journey into the World of Māori Music, by Richard Nunns (Potton and Burton)
New Zealand Photography Collected, by Athol McCredie (Te Papa Press)
Tangata Whenua: An Illustrated History, by Atholl Anderson, Judith Binney, Aroha Harris (Bridget Williams Books)
Real Modern: Everyday New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s, by Bronwyn Labrum (Te Papa Press)

Enjoy these wonderful New Zealand books and share them far and wide.

The Ockham New Zealand Book Awards are supported by the Ockham Foundation, the Acorn Foundation, Creative New Zealand and Book Tokens Ltd. You can find out who the judges are here. The winners (including of the four Best First Book Awards) will be announced at a ceremony on Tuesday May 10 2016, held as the opening night event of the Auckland Writers Festival.

The awards ceremony is open to the public for the first time. Tickets to the event can be purchased via Ticketmaster once festival bookings open on Friday 18 March. Winners of the Acorn Foundation Literary Award, for fiction, win $50,000. Winners of the other three category awards each receive $10,000, the Māori Language award $10,000, and each of the winners of the three Best First Book awards, $2,500.

by Sarah Forster, Web Editor