Oratia Books Catalogue 2023 — now in booklet form to fit a growing list of books ...

 The Oratia Books Catalogue 2023 is out now in print and digital form. 

 

The new-look catalogue is 32 pages in length, offering the scope to showcase the 16 new books we are publishing this year, along with over 100 backlist titles.

This year brings a more diverse range of books than ever, from an ever-more diverse inhouse team — as noted in the catalogue introduction that follows with screenshots of relevant pages.

Thanks to Cheryl Smith for the catalogue design and content, and Simon and team at Haysom Print for the fine print job. 

Click here to view or download the PDF, or to request a print copy please email info@oratia.co.nz

Haere mai, welcome and benvenuti to the Oratia Books Catalogue 2023. 

After six years our foldout catalogue format gives way to a booklet, largely because there was no longer space to present our growing list of books adequately. This format offers a more detailed look at both new and existing titles; to learn more visit www.oratia.co.nz. 

 

For our publishing and our people also, 2023 represents development. In 2021 Oratia committed to a diversity, equity and inclusion policy that aims to have our books and our workplace embody different ethnicities and languages, sexual orientations and genders, cultures and abilities. 

We have an expanding multicultural, multilingual team. Hirini Tane (Ngāti Kawa, Ngāti Rahiri) is now guiding our Māori publishing as Kaiārahi/Counsellor, and Ella Fischer (originally from Austria) has joined as a part-time Assistant Editor.

You can see this in our new titles: from the bilingual Moana Oceania Series books (in Cook Islands Māori, Samoan and English) to Philippa Werry’s survey of migration in the latest New Zealand Series title. Ron Crosby and Paul Moon challenge received histories in their substantial books, respectively on an overlooked but pivotal episode in the New Zealand Wars, and Auckland in the twentieth century. 

 

Te reo Māori me ōna tikanga is fundamental to Oratia. This year’s pukapuka Māori celebrate the language of humour in Te Reo Kapekape, take Robyn Kahukiwa’s stunning Ngā Atua: Māori Gods into a bilingual paperback, and bring back to print Te Rangi Hīroa’s masterpiece Vikings of the Sunrise in the New Zealand Classics series. 

We now bring our selected books from overseas authors under the new Five Oceans (Moana e Rima) umbrella. Not incidentally, this year’s addition, Lucky Me, addresses disability — extending the diversity of local titles Toku Whānau Rerehua/My Beautiful Family (written in te reo Māori about rainbow families) and The Book that Wouldn’t Read/Te Pukapuka Ka Kore E Pānuihia (separate English and te reo editions, reluctant readers).

 

Not to take things too seriously, the New Bum! phenomenon rocks on globally! There are no less than three new titles from super-duo Dawn McMillan and Ross Kinnaird, all publishing simultaneously in New Zealand, Australia, the US and the UK. Ross also teams up with Belinda O’Keefe for You Don’t Know How Lucky You Are, a bilingual romp inspired by Monty Python!  

From a small publishing house in the Oratia valley, we seek to open for you a wide window onto New Zealand and the world. 

Thank you for reading. 

My Bum is SO CHEEKY! is published worldwide

 

The latest in the hit ’Bum’ series by Dawn McMillan and Ross Kinnaird is out now in multiple editions worldwide

My Bum is SO CHEEKY! is published in a striking pink edition in New Zealand and Australia, sports a bright red cover for the UK and Europe (published by Scholastic UK), and bask in a green cover with the title My Butt is SO SILLY! in North America (with Dover Books). 

This irresistible tale of a boy whose bum has a life of its own will entertain readers from pre-school to primary age, not to mention raising a smile for the adults too. 

Available in New Zealand through Whitcoulls, then on general release from 7 March. 

The US edition and the series featuring on Dover's website ...

.. and recommended by Scholastic UK's Book Club

Support New Zealand Books

Books are essential!

We invite you to support New Zealand authors, illustrators, designers, editors and everyone one who works locally in the publishing business. Oratia Books is an independent New Zealand publisher, specialising in local children books, Māori books, history and more. Please check out our website or ask for our New Zealand-made books at your favourite bookstore.

Stay Home New Zealand, and read books :-)

As we move into lockdown in Aotearoa to combat the COVID-19 epidemic, our thoughts are with our many friends and colleagues in Italy who have endured weeks of terrible news during their time at home. The Italian campaign Io Resto a Casa (which has its equivalent in #StayHomeNZ) recommended reading as an essential activity while staying at home, and we agree. Oratia will remain open from our home offices during the Level 4 lockdown, and will do whatever we can to help Kiwis have books to read, whether in print or electronic form.

Book giveaway: New Zealand Tattoo (2012)

New Zealand Tattoo was one of Oratia’s first really big books, launched in October 2012 at Real Groovy in Auckland and showcased at the Frankfurt Book Fair, where New Zealand was guest of honour that year.

With photographer Chris Hoult we conceived of a book that, like many works in the field, showcased tattoo design — but unlike most, looked at it from the tattooists’ perspective. Chris joined journalist Steve Forbes to interview and photograph tattoo artists in their studios, creating an extended photo essay about the art as it was in late 2011/early 2012.

With its large (330 x 250 mm) hardback format and rich colour reproduction, New Zealand Tattoo — in the home of the tattooist’s art gave air to the works and words of tattooists representing the three main strands of ta moko (Māori tattoo), tatau (Pasifika tattoo) and European traditions. Steve contributed a concise history of the art form as well. The book has stood the test of the intervening years and remains a collectors’ item for followers of tattoo here and overseas. 

To be in to win a copy of New Zealand Tattoo go to our Fb Page 

Prize available to New Zealand residents only. 

Competition closes on Monday 24 June, and winner announced on Tuesday 25 June.

Special book giveaway! To the Gateways of Florence: New Zealand Forces in Tuscany, 1944 (2011)

Italy is in the blood at Oratia. Our media director Alessandra Zecchini is Italian and we volunteer and work closely with the Dante Alighieri Society in Auckland. The name for our first book imprint, Libro International, derived from the Italian word for book.  

So after Florence city councillor Stefano Fusi and his Kiwi wife Jill Gabriel hosted Alessandra, Peter and kids at Liberation Day commemorations in Tuscany in 2010 (on 25 April, the same day as Anzac Day), we knew we must publish an English edition of their fine book about how New Zealand troops helped liberate this part of Italy from German occupation during the Second World War.

To the Gateways of Florence: New Zealand Forces in Tuscany, 1944 follows the structure and layout of the original book I Giorni della Liberazione, first published by Editore NTE, edited by Stefano and translated by Jill. It collects writing by Italian and New Zealand historians, the latter represented by Christopher Pugsley, Monty Soutar and Jeffrey Plowman.

 Stefano, Jill and family visited New Zealand along with regional mayor Sestilio Dirindelli and his wife in September 2011. Together we launched the book in Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland at some memorable gatherings of old soldiers, the Italian community and supporters.

We’re down to some of the last copies of this book, so get in now to secure yours.

Enter on our Fb Page to be in to win a copy of To the Gateways of Florence. Prize available to New Zealand residents only. 

Competition closes on Monday 17 June, and winner announced on Tuesday 18 June.

Win a copy of Te Ara — Māori Pathways: Past, Present, Future (2010)

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Te Ara started life as accompanying an exhibition of photographs and taonga relating to Māori leadership in the past, present and future, curated by academic and museum director Paul Tapsell with distinguished photographer Krzysztof Pfeiffer. 

This colourful paperback has gone on to become a valued reference to contemporary Māori issues, appearing in three editions — all with English and Māori text, and then variously Polish, German and Musqueam (the First Nations language from the Vancouver area), reflecting some locations where the exhibition travelled.

See: https://www.oratia.co.nz/product/te-ara

The book developed alongside Oratia’s ongoing partnership with Paul and Krzysztof in the charitable venture Māori Maps (www.maorimaps.com), which seeks to help descendants connect with their ancestral marae. 

Later this year we’ll also be publishing Paul’s next book, written with Merata Kawharu — Whāriki: The re-emergence of Māori kin community entrepreneurship.

To be in to win a copy of Te Ara — Māori Pathways: Past, Present, Future, go to our Fb Page. 

Prize available to New Zealand residents only.

Competition closes on Monday 10 June, and winner announced on Tuesday 11 June.

Our first 10-Year Book Giveaway — Kura Toa: Warrior School, by Tim Tipene (2009)

Kura Toa: Warrior School  – Tim Tipene

The first giveaway to celebrate our 10 years of books is the first title Oratia published back in mid-2009: Tim Tipene’s Kura Toa: Warrior School. 

Haki, the hero of this young adult novel, is a high-school student who’s been going off the rails. With the guidance of his tribe, Haki finds his identity and grows into a warrior in defence of their land.

Click here to view the book.

Kura Toa had been previously published but was out of print when Tim agreed to us taking it on. Oratia committed to our authors to try and keep their books in print, and we’ve managed thanks in part to short-run digital printers in New Zealand. In fact the giveaway copy of Kura Toa is hot off the press from YourBooks in Wellington — the latest print run has just reached the Northcote warehouse of Publishers Distribution Ltd, our awesome distributors.

To be in to win a copy of Kura Toa: Warrior School go to our Fb Page.

Prize available to New Zealand residents only.

Competition closes on Monday 3 June, and winner announced on Tuesday 4 June.

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Oratia Books Catalogue 2019 out now

The Oratia Books Catalogue 2019 is now available in print and PDF formats.

We're pleased to present 11 new books for this year, along with a growing back list.

Here's what the introduction says; click here to view the entire catalogue.

In 2019 Oratia Media marks ten years of publishing our own books, and our nineteenth year as a publishing and media business. To celebrate, Oratia Books brings you at least ten titles that encompass outstanding writing and illustration in both new and revised editions.

There’s a maritime theme in adult hardbacks, with Sir Bob Harvey’s much-awaited Sea Edge celebrating the Waitematā Harbour, and Gavin McLean’s Shipwrecked: New Zealand maritime disasters, while the pensive Home Child follows a group of children shipped from the UK for adoption on the other side of the world.

Our commitment to te Ao Māori deepens with new editions of classic works by Sir Hirini Moko Mead and A.W. Reed, Merata Kawharu and Paul Tapsell’s seminal work on entrepreneurship, and Darryn Joseph’s Whakarongo ki ō Tūpuna, written in te Reo with English translation.

Dawn McMillan and Ross Kinnaird put a new comic spin on the international bestseller I Need a New Bum! with a side-splitting sequel, and Tracy Duncan gives a makeover to the most popular of Melanie Drewery’s Nanny Mihi series. In July we launch the first two titles in The NZ Series, a new non-fiction collection for young adult readers, with works by Gordon Ell and Sarah Ell.

Scottish Granny’s reading of I Need a New BumI cracks 330,000 views in under four days

MEDIA RELEASE

26 September 2018: For immediate release

The Scottish Granny Janice Clark has scored another New Zealand hit with her online reading of bestselling picture book I Need a New Bum!

The Brisbane-based Scottish gran has had 330,000 views and more than 6,500 shares on Facebook since posting a video on Saturday evening reading the book to grandson Archer — and sales are on a roll.

The Scottish Granny cracks up on reading I Need a New Bum!

Video of the Scottish Granny reduced to gales of laughter has made this already the second-most popular post by the Scottish Granny, in the wake of another Kiwi children’s hit, The Wonky Donkey. 

I Need a New Bum! is already a bestseller, having sold over 50,000 copies in New Zealand since publication in 2012. On Monday Whitcoulls again named it among its annual Kids’ Top 50.

Author Dawn McMillan has been dazzled by interest following the Scottish Granny’s reading, saying: “I’m just thrilled with the success of this book and reaching kids and adult readers around the world.”

Sales spikes are on the cards for the US edition (I Need a New Butt!), plus the Chinese — helped by illustrator Ross Kinnaird’s promotional visit to Beijing last week. 

Promotional poster for a bookshop appearched by Ross Kinnaird in Beijing on 16 September 

New Zealand publisher Oratia Books is planning a hurried reprint of I Need a New Bum! to meet demand. 

The book shows the imaginings of a boy who discovers his bum has a crack and sets out to find a new one. 

ENDS

The Scottish Granny reads I Need a New Bum!

Facebook phenomenon The Scottish Granny has done it again! Her reading last night of I Need a New Bum!, the bestseller by Dawn McMillan and Ross Kinnaird, was a crack-up – and has caused a surge of interest from around the world. 

Her reading of Craig Smith's Wonky Donkey led to a massive spike in book sales, so it's lucky that we have a decent stock of books in the warehouse.

Click below to see the Granny and grandson reading I Need a New Bum!

Oratia Books - Catalogue 2018

Click here to see and download the catalogue PDF

Māui – Sun Catcher, the video

Māui – Sun Catcher
Author: Tim Tipene
Illustrator: Zak Waipara
Translator: Rob Ruha  

ISBN: 978-0-947506-14-8  |  RRP $24.99
Hardback, 270 x 210 mm, 32 pages colour

Click here to find out more about the book

 Rob Ruha

 Tim Tipene

 Zak Waipara