Saturday Morning for Saturday 6 April 2024

8.12 Nathan Thrall - A Day in the Life of Abed Salama

Jerusalem-based American journalist and author Nathan Thrall's new book is named on ten best books of the year lists, including The New Yorker, The Economist and the Financial Times.

A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: A Palestine Story is a portrait of life in Israel and Palestine, giving an understanding of what it's like to live there, based on the real events of one tragic day, where Jewish and Palestinian characters' lives and pasts unexpectedly converge.

Thrall has spent a decade at the International Crisis Group, where he was director of the Arab-Israeli Project.  His first book, published in 2017 is The Only Language They Understand: Forcing Compromise in Israel and Palestine.

9.05 Simon Young - from Pickering to Pitcairn mayor

Simon Young is the first non-native mayor of Pitcairn. Originally from Yorkshire in the UK, Simon visited Pitcairn in 1992 and liked it so much he returned permanently in 1999 with his wife Shirley.

Simon was elected mayor in 2022, becoming the first non-native to head the island's government.

Pitcairn is home to fifty people, distant relatives of the mutinous crewmates of the HMS Bounty.

9.25 Dr Ellen Joan Ford - rethinking work hours #workschoolhours

Former New Zealand Army captain, Dr Ellen Joan Ford, was recognised with a Kiwibank Local Hero award last year for her work leading a team that freed over 500 Afghan refugees when the Taliban seized control in 2021. Ellen led this team remotely from her living room, during the Covid pandemic.

Ellen, who now teaches leadership in business and high performance teams has a new fight on her hands: making working parents life better, under the banner #workschoolhours, striving to rethink the outdated current work model by providing a path forward that creates a win-win at home and work.

9:45 Matt Alt - Oppenheimer in Japan

Oppenheimer has finally opened in Japan, eight months after it was released in the US.

Japanese distributors delayed the release, following criticism the movie minimises the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and to distance it from offensive "Barbenheimer" memes.

The seven times Oscar winner, which tells of the race to develop the atomic bomb, grossed $US 2.5 million in its first weekend in Japanese cinemas.

Tokyo based author of Pure Invention: How Japan Made the Modern World Matt Alt joins Colin Peacock with how the film is being received.

10.05 Richard Shaw: The Unsettled

Political commentator, academic and author Richard Shaw's new book The Unsettled confronts colonial land theft through Pākehā settler stories.

A follow up to his 2021 book The Forgotten Coast, a personal story of his family history highlighting what he calls "the shady bits beneath our family tree, specifically, the land which underpinned his family's security and prosperity, taken from tangata whenua.

10.25 Self-confessed taphophile: Deborah Challinor

Bestselling writer Deborah Challinor explores the world of Victorian funeral customs in the first book in a new series Black Silk and Sympathy.

Deborah has written eighteen novels of historical fiction, including young adult novels, and two works of non-fiction about the Vietnam War.  She speaks with Colin Peacock about her fascination with graves, cemeteries and funerals and how this interest shines in the first of a new series telling the tale of Sydney's first female undertaker.

11.05 Jason Gunn - playing favourites

Childrens' television presenter turned author, Jason Gunn joins Colin Peacock to play favourites.

Jason is taking part in the Auckland Writers Festival's Schools Programme Hōtaka Kura and has written two books for children with his brother Andrew.

Jason started in children's television with 'Jase TV' and the long-running 'Son of a Gunn Show', before co-hosting 'Dancing With The Stars', 'The Rich List' and 'Wheel of Fortune'.

 

Books featured on the show:

A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: A Palestine Story
By: Nathan Thrall
Published by Penguin Random House NZ
ISBN: 9780241702208

#WorkSchoolHours
By: Dr Ellen Joan Ford

The Unsettled
By: Richard Shaw
Published by Massey University Press
ISBN: 9781991016683

Black Silk & Sympathy
By: Deborah Challinor
Published by HarperCollins Publishers
ISBN: 9781460716021

Music played in this show

Song: Conquest of Paradise
Artist: Vangelis
Time played: 11:15

Song: Butterfly Fly Away
Artist: Miley Cyrus and Billy Ray Cyrus
Time played: 11:25

Song: Fix You
Artist: Coldplay
Time played: 11:35

Song: Binary Sunset
Artist: John Williams
Time played: 11:45

Song: Washed in the River
Artist Paul Ruske and Soweto Gospel Choir
Time played:  11:52