Anzac Day 2018

On Anzac Day, I'll be remembering the great crew - Aussies and Kiwis, as well as our wonderful Turkish guide Baris, who made up the Gallipoli Volunteers team of 2014.

I'll be thinking of the Anzac services at Kaiparoro, Wairarapa, and Broweena, Queensland, two small communities that are continuing to commemorate the special link between them and their WW1 bridges.

I'll remember our tūpuna who travelled far from home to Gallipoli, the Western Front and the Pacific, including Louisa Bird, one of the first nurses to leave New Zealand for the war in April 1915.

At our local Anzac Day service, we'll remember the people from our community who left for war, some of whom didn't return. 

This year, I'll also be thinking of those who lost their lives, their livelihoods, their land or their loved ones in the New Zealand Wars.

Anzac week 2015

This was my Anzac week:

Book tour in south Taranaki: lots of great kids and librarians, library displays, the Hawera water tower lit up at night, the beach at Opunake, small town war memorials everywhere, Ronald Hugh Morrieson memorabilia!

Anzac parade, and the little children loving the red poppies, scooping up armfuls of them afterwards.

Arriving at the 5.30am dawn service at 5am and finding it already packed.
Visiting the new Great War exhibition in the old museum.
Reading messages left at our local war memorial.

Watching the dawn service at Gallipoli on the big screen, exchanging messages with last year's Gallipoli Volunteers - wonderful people (here are some of them!) - and all of us thinking about this year's Red Coats, working hard but having an amazing time!

New Anzac Day books

Some lovely books coming out in time for this year's Anzac Day. Here are two of them:

The last Anzac by Gordon Winch, illustrated by Harriet Bailey. Harriet was kind enough to answer some questions for me about the book and her beautiful illustrations, which I've posted on my Children's war books blog.



Roly the Anzac donkey by Glyn Harper, beautifully illustrated by Jenny Cooper - also reviewed here on my blog, and no 1 on the NZ children's bestseller list last week:



An unexpected hero by L.P Hansen is not an Anzac Day book as such, but it has some interesting perspectives on the idea of heroism in war. Linda Hansen shared some of her thoughts about it with me here. 



And a book that came out last year - Meet the Anzacs by Claire Saxby, illustrated by Max Berry. Claire also answered some questions for me about her work, and in return hosted me on her blog, called Let's have words. (And look at her post for 12 April - a lovely pairing in an Auckland shop window!) 

#

Anzac Day: the day after

I love the fact that people are continuing to find new and creative ways of marking Anzac Day and the days leading up to it.

Here in Wellington, instead of just handing over poppies on Poppy Day, a host of volunteers spent hours planting them on Midland Park so people could pick their own poppy in return for a donation.

 

At the NZ Academy of Fine Arts on Queen's Wharf, Donna Sarten's installation Strange Fruit uses 3890 military dog tags suspended from the ceiling (each one stamped with the veteran's name and number) to show the number of New Zealanders who went to Vietnam.



I read about restaurants and movie theatres offering Anzac Day discounts to veterans, and Wellington even hosted a historic game of ARL football: St Kilda vs Sydney Swans (the first ever AFL clash played outside of Australia as part of the premiership season) which included the presentation of the Simpson-Henderson Trophy, honouring the stretcher-bearer heroes of Gallipoli.



In our family, we managed to attend Anzac Day services in three different countries. My sister and her husband got up at 3am to drive into central Sydney for the dawn service at 4.15am. I'm so proud of them (and also of my nephew who attended as well)- what a big effort to make!

One daughter is in New Caledonia on a school French trip, and the students were invited to join the Anzac Day service in Noumea - a very special occasion, as it was also being attended by 84 New Zealand WW2 veterans, there to mark the 70th anniversary of New Zealand's involvement in the Pacific war.

Meanwhile we went to our own local Anzac Day service, attended by adults, children and babies, Brownies, Guides and Scouts, St John's - and even a neighbourhood cat which wandered in and and seemed quite at home.

It has been a busy few weeks, with two book launches, several school visits and a number of interviews. But I am so grateful to everyone who has bought a copy of Anzac Day: the New Zealand story, for themselves or to give away. Thanks for helping put the book on the best seller list for the last 6 weeks (including one week at number one!) And thanks to everyone who has taken the trouble to tell me - in person or by email - that they've enjoyed it, or to share with me their own family stories of involvement in war.

Here are a few places you can go to see, hear or read more about the book:

• Radio New Zealand: Nine to Noon with Kathryn Ryan, Tuesday 23 April 2013.

(Thanks to Kathryn and the rest of the Nine to Noon team for making this live interview as stress-free as possible!)

• Breakfast TV, Anzac Day (Thursday 25 April)

"Brooke Dobson speaks with author Philippa Werry about her new book, 'Anzac Day, The New Zealand Story'."

• Teaching kids about Anzac Day - interview with Kate Geenty for the Essential Mums section of the Stuff website (not just for Essential Mums!)


• Marking Anzac Day as a family - guest blog for Kiwi families.

Anzac Day: the New Zealand story book launch x 2

Following the first launch in Wellington  we then held a second launch in Auckland, this time hosted by the National Library in Parnell. Christine Thomson and Amanda Robinson were both there from New Holland Publishers, as well as Nick Turzynski who did the amazing design work. Maria Gill said some very kind words in introducing the book, the National Library staff were wonderful hosts and and John Graham from Paper Plus was a very genial bookseller.


Christine Thomson and Nick Turzynski


Amanda Robinson, New Holland Publishers


My lovely daughter Charlotte doing the Auckland reading

Anzac Day: the New Zealand story book launch x 1

Thanks to everyone - friends, family and members of the writing community who came along to one of the two book launches for my new book Anzac Day: the New Zealand story.

The Wellington book launch was very kindly hosted last Thursday by John and Ruth McIntyre of the wonderful Children's Bookshop in Kilbirnie, and Stephen Clarke, Chief Executive of the RSA, did the honours of formally introducing the book.


John and Ruth McIntyre


Stephen Clarke, Chief Executive of the RSA




My lovely daughter Lizzie doing a reading

Book trailer

Anzac Day: the New Zealand story: what it is and why it matters 

Due out March 2013

What is Anzac Day? What does Anzac stand for? Why do we have Anzac Day? Why does it matter? I hope that my new book will answer all these questions and more. You will discover lots of things you didn't know about Anzac Day including what the different parts of the service mean and what happens on Anzac Day, here and around the world.

And you can view the Anzac Day book trailer here.

 

Anzac Day: the New Zealand story

Here in Wellington, our New Year has got off to a great start. We are halfway through a promised run of ten days of fine weather - and if you know Wellington  you'll know that ten days of sunshine, 25 degree temperatures and no wind (especially no wind!) is something of a minor miracle.

The cruise ships sail in each morning, the cruise ship passengers stroll up and down the waterfront and I'm sure they must be thinking what a beautiful city this is - and they're right! The ships sail out again at the end of the day over a glassy still harbour, lights twinkling all around it, and then a huge orange full moon rises over Mt Victoria. it's stunning.

My own New Year also got off to a very good start when I received the advance copy of my new book, so here is the cover:



More details and a book trailer coming soon!