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:her great reads Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake Anna Quindlen Windmill (Random House NZ) $26.99 Her GREAT READS Here's a quick look at some of our top picks for reads this month: In this irresistible memoir, the New York Times bestselling author and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Anna Quindlen, writes about looking back and ahead – and celebrating it all – as she considers marriage, girlfriends, our mothers, faith, loss, all the stuff in our closets, and more. Quindlen says for us here what we may wish we could have said ourselves. Using her past, present, and future to explore what matters most to women at different ages, Quindlen talks about marriage, girlfriends, our bodies and parenting. From childhood memories to manic motherhood to middle age, Quindlen uses the events of her life to illuminate our own. Along with the downsides of age, she says, can come wisdom, a perspective on life that makes it satisfying and even joyful. Candid, funny, moving, Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake is filled with the sharp insights and revealing observations that have long confirmed Quindlen's status as America's laureate of real life. The Elusive Language of Ducks Judith White Random House NZ (Vintage), $37.99 Called The Elusive Language of Ducks, it's ultimately a heart-warming and optimistic novel about human relationships, which tugs at the heart strings and makes for a richly rewarding, multi-layered and absorbing read that will resonate. White says that the novel was triggered by the unexpected and not exactly welcome arrival of an orphan duckling. As it grew, she became fascinated by the intricate design of its development and eventually started to make journal notes about its progress. Meanwhile the duck became attached to her, and she reluctantly became attached to the duck. Ducko in the book evolved from there. "I'm pretty sure most people with pets will admit to finding themselves talking to them, either in their heads or out loud, as my character Hannah does with her duck. Most of us probably don't take it to her obsessive extremes, but it's something we tend to do because they are there, following us around in a companionable way." On one level, the novel can be read as a whimsical story about a woman's attachment to a pet duck that she's reared."But the duck provides a much more complex device for me to unpack Hannah's relationship difficulties and unresolved issues that she's grappling with. The duck's pretty much Hannah's alter-ego and proves to be the catalyst that brings everything to a head. "Pets are the perfect confidants. They listen, they don't tell anyone and we can imagine they understand," laughs White. The writing Class Stephanie Johnson Random House NZ, $37.99 Merle Carbury teaches Creative Writing at a local university. A long time ago she published five novels and was a successful author in her own right. Her younger colleague Garteth, who also teaches Creative Writing at the same tertiary institution, once won a prestigious international writing prize with his first and only novel. All of Merle's students are writing novels and every one has his/ her own opinion on how to go about it. Set in a nameless harbour city, The Writing Class focuses on the lives of all those, directly and indirectly, involved in the Creative Writing classes final semester as the students prepare to submit their novels. As Merle mentors their assorted ambitions, observes, the romantic entanglements of her colleague, worries about her husband, and is intrigued by their mysterious German lodger; she both imparts and embodies how to write a novel. There are lots of books on how to write, but very few novels on the subject,' says author Stephanie Johnson. I wanted to write a novel about writing - so that everything in it reflected the process from inspiration to execution, and everything in between. Woven into the narrative are classes on writing, eg plot and story, opening paragraphs and endings. 114 | www. h e rmagaz i n e . c o. n z