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Healing the sick, and the self

WHEN I think of all the novels I've read set in psychiatric hospitals, they fall into two basic types.

Bishop's Queen: A life with Brian

When crisis hit Destiny Church's Brisbane branch, it was Hannah Tamaki who was sent to sort out the mess. As Tony Wall reports, the good bishop's wife runs the operation from behind the scenes with an iron fist.

Alice's real life no wonderland

The eternally eccentric story of Alice in Wonderland is making another comeback. Just as Tim Burton's film is in the cinemas, Melanie Benjamin's novel Alice I Have Been can be added to the list of different takes on the Lewis Carroll classic.

Staying afloat in a sea of loss

Anne Else finds Elizabeth Smither's latest novel a bumpy but ultimately pleasurable journey.

Lightning conductor

A musical collaboration has taken Bill Manhire into new poetic territory. By Mark Broatch.

I'm famous for getting into trouble

Lisa Lewis burst into the media spotlight as an All Blacks streaker in 2006 and her genius for self-promotion has kept her there ever since. She tells Tim Hume about her transformation from a churchgoing teenager into New Zealand's celebrity prostitute.

The squawk of success

Twenty years ago, Canterbury's Banks Peninsula was awash with tui song. Then they disappeared. Kim Knight reports on a breeding programme returning this feisty, iconic species to Canterbury.

How Simple Minds got their mojo back

Jim Kerr tells Grant Smithies how Simple Minds got their mojo back after the 1990s' wilderness years.

The book of the film of the story of my life as a movie critic

MARK KERMODE, for those who don't know, is the usually entertaining, always certain and occasionally ranting film critic for BBC Radio Five Live.

SAS out of the shadows

The NZ SAS is used to operating below the radar, yet their mission in Afghanistan has never been more visible. Has recent publicity made their job any harder, asks Jon Stephenson.

Politics of print media laid bare

TOM RACHMAN concocts a cast of abrasive and cantankerous characters in his debut novel The Imperfectionists.

Breaking the news

By STEVE KILGALLON - Sunday Star Times

Some sporting bodies are trying to control what you see and hear.

Waking up with the Don

The world-famous property tycoon talks to Megan Nicol Reed.

Engaging sideways look at English village life

By ANNE ELSE - Sunday Star Times

IN HER debut novel, Helen Simonson – born and raised in England, but a US resident for 20 years – harks nostalgically back to the village life of her childhood, complete with eccentric spinsters, vicars, dogs, a lord of the manor and, of course, a retired major.

Timber epic a riveting read

THE POET, short story writer and novelist Ron Rash was born in Boiling Springs, North Carolina, beneath the shadow of MtMitchell in the forested Southern Appalachian ranges.

Photography masterclass

Competition details inside!

Taking a good photo has never been easier, thanks to digital cameras.

This Way of Life

A powerful documentary about a Maori family is wowing a global audience.

Phil Judd: Fallen idol

Phil Judd, founding member of Split Enz tells Tim Hume about the trauma of jail.

Law and disorder

The Solomon Islands is New Zealand's biggest foreign aid recipient, where we've been peacekeeping and nation-building since 2003. Tim Hume talks exclusively to the Pacific warlord who was at the centre of the country's ethnic conflict, and examines the future of the Kiwi mission.

Q&A with author Chad Taylor

The author of seven novels, Chad Taylor is living in London and at work on several new books.

Unreliable history books plot twisted course to a good night's sleep

Nicholas Reid discovers two contrasting history books are better for those with a short attention span.

Sci-fi creation throws light on grey areas

By KATE MEAD - Sunday Star Times

WHILE THE concept of getting a nose for a birthday present, seeking out silver spoons, and losing thumbs may sound like something out of an imaginative children's book, Shades of Grey is anything but a juvenile novel to be scoffed at. Jasper Fforde works his magic by creating a futuristic world filled with people living by a Colortocracy. In this time, the power lies with the people who can see the most vibrant hues of colour. Everyone is placed on a Chromatic Scale and separated by the particular colour they can see, with "the Greys" placed on the bottom rung of this repressed society.

Guided tour of drug hell

ORAN CANFIELD, the son of an American self-help guru, a self-confessed crackhead junkie and alcoholic, has written what appears to be a handbook on bad parenting.

Back behind bars

The first female reporter ever to enter Paremoremo is granted a rare return visit.

The high price of subsidies

By LUKE MALPAS - Sunday Star Times

When it comes to handing out taxpayers' dollars, is the film industry really more deserving than the rest of us?

Remembering a legend

By KIM KNIGHT - Sunday Star Times

She's been singing her mother's songs her entire life.

End of the celebrity chef

Stephen Long has had a cookbook clean-out. So who made the grade?

Hell fire

On the first anniversary of the Victorian bushfires that killed 173 people, Kinglake resident Jane O'Connor recalls the horror of Black Saturday in this extract from a new book.

Return ticket, first class

TIME'S ARROW darts backwards and forwards in The Pregnant Widow, Martin Amis's complete and brilliantly burnished fourteenth novel. Most of the story's scenes take place in the 1970s, when the sexual revolution was in full swing. The fallout from that time forms the rest of the story, set in the now-historical noughties, a time that saw the children of the revolution lecture their parents on promiscuity's new etiquette (asking him to give you a call after the act is emotional blackmail).

'Their deaths are on our hands'

Peter Singer, world-famous philosopher, says we have a moral duty to give money to the poor. He talks with Anthony Hubbard ahead of a visit to New Zealand next month.

Our Bright Star

By DENISE MCNABB - Sunday Star Times

Kiwi director Jane Campion reckons her latest film is her best ever.

2666 and all that

Roberto Bolano's door-stopper is a massive popular success and has been hailed by some critics as a masterpiece, but Nicholas Reid has a few reservations.

'A most wonderful eccentric'

Sunday Star Times

Strangers knew him as the smartly suited Englishman who rode his bicycle around the streets of Christchurch. Friends knew him as a frugal, cultured individual who lived quietly in a tiny rented flat. And when he died Norman Barrett left $1.8m to the city's public art gallery. By Kim Knight.

OZ vs NZ: The BIG showdown

Peter FitzSimons gamely defends Australia fair, and Jeremy Corbett sticks the boot in further.

By the ditch divided

It's time to stop obsessing over Australia, write Jennifer Curtin and Mark Broatch.

Death from above

'Unethical and cruel', 'unfair slaughter', 'an abomination' – emotions are running high over moves by DoC to allow hunting by helicopter on public land in South Island high country. As Tony Wall reports, a group of recreational hunters are waging an online 'guerrilla war' to convince the government to outlaw the practice.