Celebrating the depth and diversity of BC publishing
On Friday, October 20th at 6pm, join Massy Arts, Massy Books and House of Anansi Press in welcoming Kōtuku Titihuia Nuttall to celebrate her innovative novel Tauhou. Kōtuku will be joined by moderator Shirarose Wilensky.
“…Masterful dialogue and rich scenes move emotions like the currents around Aotearoa and the Salish Seas, a beautiful display of lyricism that loudly proclaims that Kōtuku Titihuia Nuttall belongs in the crescendo of rising voices in CanLit. Tauhou is not a collection to miss!” — jaye simpson, author of it was never going to be okay
“The stories in this collection move like the waves of the ocean that divide Vancouver Island and Aotearoa. Once you emerge from Tauhou’s narrative depths, you’ll miss its imagination, its rhythms, its heart.” — Alicia Elliott, author of A Mind Spread Out on the Ground
Venue & Accessibility
The event will be hosted at the Massy Arts Gallery, at 23 East Pender Street in Chinatown, Vancouver.
Registration is free and required for entrance.
The gallery is wheelchair accessible and a gender-neutral washroom is on-site. Please refrain from wearing scents or heavy perfumes.
For more on accessibility including parking, seating, venue measurements and floor plan, and how to request ASL interpretation please visit: massyarts.com/accessibility
Covid Protocols: Masks keep our community safe and are mandatory (N95 masks are recommended as they offer the best protection). We ask if you are showing symptoms, that you stay home. Thank you kindly.
About the book:
Tauhou (House of Anansi Press, 2023)
An inventive exploration of Indigenous families, womanhood, and alternate post-colonial realities by a writer of Māori and Coast Salish descent.
Tauhou envisions a shared past between two Indigenous cultures, set on reimagined versions of Vancouver Island and Aotearoa that sit side by side in the ocean. Each chapter in this innovative hybrid novel is a fable, an autobiographical memory, a poem. A monster guards cultural objects in a museum, a woman uncovers her own grave, another woman remembers her estranged father. On rainforest beaches and grassy dunes, sisters and cousins contend with the ghosts of the past — all the way back to when the first foreign ships arrived on their shores.
In a testament to the resilience of Indigenous women, the two sides of this family, Coast Salish and Māori, must work together in understanding and forgiveness to heal that which has been forced upon them by colonialism. Tauhou is an ardent search for answers, for ways to live with truth. It is a longing for home, to return to the land and sea.
About the author
KŌTUKU TITIHUIA NUTTALL (Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, W̱SÁNEĆ) holds an MA from the International Institute of Modern Letters. She won the 2020 Adam Foundation Prize and was runner-up in the 2021 Surrey Hotel-Newsroom writer’s residency award. She lives on the Kāpiti Coast of Aotearoa New Zealand.
About the moderator
Shirarose Wilensky is an editor at House of Anansi Press, where she specializes in literary upmarket fiction and narrative non-fiction by BIPOC, LGBTQ2S+, and emerging writers. A winner of the Editors Canada Tom Fairley Award, she attended Simon Fraser University’s Master of Publishing Program and has worked for Arsenal Pulp Press, Greystone Books, Douglas & McIntyre, and Harbour Publishing. She lives in Port Moody, BC.
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This project has been made possible by the Government of Canada. Ce projet a été rendu possible grâce au gouvernement du Canada.