August 3rd was special for us this year. We launched Eleanor Catton’s new Man Booker long-listed novel The Luminaries, published by Victoria University Press; a mammoth tome at 832 pages. We had an inkling that it would be a bigger-than-usual launch, and we were right – roughly 200 people showed up and packed the store full to celebrate the publication. Eleanor Catton came down from Auckland to speak about the novel, telling us a bit about her process in writing it and what she had done for research.
She was introduced by Fergus Barrowman, publisher at VUP, and Elizabeth Knox, whose most recent novel we launched earlier in the year.
Photos © Matt Bialostocki // Unity Books
We would like to thank everyone who came out that night to make the launch such a success. And of course, thank you for supporting NZ literature.