Unity Books Archives - Which way is starboard again?

Fuck. Drugs. Sex.

If the above upsets or offends you, you can stop reading, you have that right – a right that has been taken away from a bunch of young Kiwis who may want to read a book called Into the River .

For non-New Zealand readers, the book – an award-winning novel aimed at young adults – is at the center of an embarrassing furore after being removed from the shelves following a complaint by conservative lobby group Family First. The group is concerned about some of the book’s content, including drug taking, language and sexual themes.

While it hasn’t been officially ‘banned’ as such, at the moment it is illegal to buy it, sell it or loan it to one of your mates until a classification decision is made on it. In this case they are looking for an age restriction.

I’m not a huge bandwagon jumper, but I am on this one boots and all – and not just because I love books and am a writer myself.

Civil disobedience through silent reading - a protest reading of Into the River held in Wellington — Civil disobedience through silent reading – a protest reading of Into the River held in Wellington

Firstly, encouraging young people to read is a huge thing. It helps them learn about themselves, empathise with others and start thinking about their place in the world. If we can’t give our young people enough respect to make their own decisions about reading and learn for themselves what works for them and what doesn’t, that says a lot more about us than it does about them.

And how dumb do we think these kids actually are? Do people really think that they would never have thought about having sex or taking drugs if they hadn’t read about it in a book? What about the TV shows and films they are bombarded with? What about life? You can’t ban that.

All Family First is going to achieve is to make a book many kids had probably never heard of seem that much more attractive.

When I was in primary school a ‘helpful’ librarian wouldn’t let me take Anne of Avonlea from the school library because it had ‘adult themes’ – so I turned around and got it out of the local library instead.

The same librarian blocked me from taking out the Lord of the Rings trilogy because it was deemed too ‘difficult’. We had a ‘five finger word test’ where if you got more than five words wrong reading a passage aloud, you weren’t allowed to take that book out. (It was the 80s, they had some strange ideas.) And being Tolkien of course I had pronunciation problems and failed miserably. In the end I borrowed a copy from one of my Mum’s friends – gleefully announcing which page I was up to at silent reading time “page 1015 today Miss” (yes I was ‘that’ kid).

I pinched my Dad’s copy of Jaws (sorry Dad!) when I was about 10 or 11 because word around the school was that it had rude bits in it. I wasn’t particularly interested in the book but I got kudos from some of the standard 4 boys for having a copy. In the end I ended up secretly reading the whole thing and rather enjoyed it (and didn’t really understand the rude bits anyway).

Of course libraries and librarians have changed a lot now. They are still careful about what they lend to who but they are realists and their main goal is to encourage reading. As a school librarian said on Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report yesterday there are books available in school libraries that have much dodgier content – The Game of Thrones series for a start – good luck getting that banned!

I have read the supposedly dodgy bits of Into the River and didn’t find them terribly shocking. I had read much worse myself as a teen. In fact one of the scenes refers to a girl ‘floating away on a Lilo of pleasure’ which just made me giggle and want to go for a swim.

Funnily enough, despite the mind polluting material I read as a teen, when it came to writing my own book I ended up censoring myself. I wrote a chapter about utterly losing it around half way to Tonga and originally used the phrase “I want off this effing boat!” My editor came back with a simple suggestion – “why don’t you just say fuck?”. I was a little taken aback, but he had a point. At that point of the story, I was really really upset. There was no point in beating about the bush. Because there weren’t a lot of swears in the book when they did appear it gave the scene that much more impact. We weren’t going for shock value. It was a way of illustrating that something was really scary or frustrating.

Today a group of like-minded book lovers (including the fabulous NZ writer Elizabeth Knox) demonstrated the ridiculousness of the situation by holding a silent reading of Into the River in protest outside Wellington’s Unity Books . The books had to be read outside the store or the shop could be considered to be ‘displaying’ them and risk a fine. Those tempted to let somebody read their copy over their shoulder were also technically in the gun for $10,000.

Kiwi writer Elizabeth Knox takes a stand against censorship

Brown paper packaging - Sarah and Steph from the NZ Book Council smuggle in their own banned books — Brown paper packaging – Sarah and Steph from the NZ Book Council smuggle in their own banned books

It was great to see such a good turn out on a grey Wellington day, fighting censorship and supporting a Kiwi writer.

Civil disobedience through reading is awesome.

Discovery through reading is awesome.

Reading is awesome.

And as far as I am concerned anyone who tries to fetter access to that is the enemy.

The last couple of weeks have been an amazing, exciting, terrifying blur.

I nervously presented my book-baby to the world and so far the reaction has been really positive.

I even had one lovely reviewer describe it as a “Monty Python sketch come to life” (see lovely review here) which is more than I could ever ask for!

Of course being me, I wasn’t going to do anything by halves (or the easy way) – so instead of one terrifying book launch, I decided to have three.

The first launch was at Wellington’s Unity Books – which is an amazing independent book store and my local. Having a launch there was the pinnacle of book-geekdom as far as I was concerned so I was absolutely rapt when they agreed to do it.

The elation turned to terror when I suddenly realised that I had signed myself up for getting up in front of a group of people and talking about sailing, the book and mental health.

They billed the thing as an ‘event’ which made me even more nervous. It sounded like people were expecting a song and dance routine!

Lunchtime 'event' - complete with book boat and seamonster! — Lunchtime ‘event’ – complete with book boat and sea monster!

It’s rather ironic, given that my day job involves advising people on how to present themselves to the public and deal with the media, that I am terrified of public speaking (and don’t even get me started on media interviews) myself.

I’m the person behind the notepad, I do writing, not talking.

Despite my misgivings, launch number 1 went really well. Aided largely by the fact that I was standing behind a desk so people couldn’t see how much my knees were shaking

We had a great crowd of people (they even had to get more chairs!) including my lovely supportive workmates (who totally weren’t frog-marched over from our office across the road) family members who I hadn’t seen for years, friends and even a few random strangers. The guys at the book store told me afterwards that getting randoms to a first book launch is quite a good sign!

The real star of the show however was my dress. A fabulous cat in the hat number designed by Catherine at Caff10. She’s a Hamilton-based clothing designer who does really funky, really reasonable stuff. Check it out for yourself .

Cat in the hat frock - courtesy of Caff10 — Cat in the hat frock – courtesy of Caff10

The Captain and I (he scrubs up alright doesn't he? — The Captain and I (he scrubs up alright doesn’t he?)

I read a chapter called I Want My Cat! and got to sign lots of books for people, which was brilliant. Signing a copy of a book you wrote is the most amazing feeling which I am certain will never get old.

The folks at Unity were brilliant. They made me feel really welcome, helped calm my nerves and even did a really cool write-up afterwards which you can read here:

The second book launch was a necessity. A boatie book had to have a celebration at a boatie place so I did a signing and talk at the Evans Bay Yacht Club.

When I first told people I was having a launch at a yacht club they thought it would be really snobby, all boat shoes and suits.

Evan’s Bay isn’t like that though. As well as a base for learning to sail it is a working boat yard, full of some of the most amazing, down to earth people I have ever met.

The whole thing was a much more relaxed affair (the two beers and a wine I had before doing the talk may have gone some way to settle my nerves too). I read different chapter called Floating Trailer Trash about how yachties looked out for each other and I think that went down pretty well. I also got to sport another lovely Caff10 dress – this time covered in cat faces with love heart eyes (yes there is a theme here…)

As the yachties asked questions, heckled Paddy and gossiped with my parents I felt more and more at home. Several came up to me afterwards to share boating stories and a couple even quietly pulled me aside to say they lived with anxiety too and thanked me for speaking out.

I left with a huge smile on my face thinking “these are my people.”

Book launch number three had been in the making since before I’d even finished the book. I was on a regular pilgrimage down to Oamaru (where I lived and worked for a few years at the Oamaru Mail) when I came across a store called Adventure Books. It’s a gorgeous shop that specialises in adventure and travel books and it has its very own indoor boat. I immediately decided I had to have a launch there.

A few Oamaru connections making a few inquiries later and it was all on. I even did an interview with the Oamaru Mail which felt very surreal I can tell you!

The plan was I would do a reading and a signing and take part in a ‘slide night’. It was the first time I had done my book spiel with pictures and I was a little nervous about how it would go, but I needn’t have worried. The shop was awesome, the crowd was awesome and having photos to talk to meant I could relax and ad-lib a bit more.

Lots of locals came up to chat and ask questions afterwards and it felt like a real success.

Another thing I got a kick out of was seeing my poster all around town, in cafes and shop windows and in the historic precinct. It felt pretty cool to be world-famous in Oamaru.