BridgCover - Thorndon by Kirsty Gunnet Williams Books pub­lish­es a series called BWB Texts, “short books on big sub­jects by great New Zealand writ­ers”, and two new ones will be launched next Thurs­day at Uni­ty Books. Mar­tin Edmond’s Bare­foot Years recounts child­hood mem­o­ries of life near Ohakune, while Thorn­don: Welling­ton and Home, My Kather­ine Mans­field Project by Kirsty Gunn (Rain, The Big Music) will be of par­tic­u­lar inter­est to Welling­to­ni­ans. This slim book “zig-zags across Thorn­don streets, Welling­ton hills and New Zealand child­hoods to explore the mean­ing of home,” and you can join Gunn with her zig-zag­ging for a walk­ing tour of Thorn­don on Wednes­day the 8th.

Thorn­don’s not just about polit­i­cal gos­sip, right-wing alpacas and the long shad­ow of Te Ahu­mairan­gi Hill. Our own Alf Rune has teased out some of the sto­ries—of lawyers’ duels, “Gay Going’s-on”, bohemi­an affairs and expres­sion­ist Brutalism—that lie under the gen­teel sub­ur­ban sur­face. I like to think that the pub­lish­er’s choice of the phrase “zig-zags” is a ref­er­ence to “the asphalt zigzag where the fen­nel grows wild” in Mans­field­’s ‘The Wind Blows’: a path that Alf also tra­versed on his trek between sky­ways and under­pass­es. Gunn is an inci­sive writer, and I’m no doubt that both the book and the tour will delve deeply into the rich veins of mean­ing beneath Thorn­don’s zig-zag­ging streets.