{"id":530306,"date":"2026-07-17T07:43:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T07:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/530306\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T07:43:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T07:43:12","slug":"theyve-delighted-generations-of-people-jack-tames-favourite-new-zealand-authors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/530306\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018They\u2019ve delighted generations of people\u2019: Jack Tame\u2019s favourite New Zealand authors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to The Spinoff Books Confessional<\/a>, in which we get to know the reading habits of Aotearoa writers, and guests. This week: host of TVNZ\u2019s Q+A, Jack Tame.<\/p>\n

The book I wish I\u2019d written<\/p>\n

Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe. Stonking journalism. Brilliant storytelling. Haunting and tragic.<\/p>\n

The book everyone should read<\/p>\n

Being Mortal by Atul Guwande. It\u2019s a profound and moving examination of end-of-life care, modern medicine, what ultimately makes a good death. It\u2019s especially relevant in the US where the provision of healthcare often focuses on the extension of life rather than quality of life, but it confronts what is an enduring taboo for many of us.<\/p>\n

The book I want to be buried with<\/p>\n

The Complete Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle. My dad read The Hound of the Baskervilles to me when I was nine or 10, and I was hooked. It ultimately led me to other detective and spy fiction (John Le Carre, Martin Cruz Smith etc), but I have re-read Sherlock Holmes more than anything else.<\/p>\n

\"ThreeFrom left to right: The book Jack Tame wishes he\u2019d written; the book he thinks we all need to read; and the book he\u2019d be buried with.
\nThe first book I remember reading by myself<\/p>\n

As a kid\u00a0I loved Osborne puzzle books. I\u2019d get a half dozen from the library at a time and devour them. The few times in life I pulled a sickie was so that I could lie in bed and read them. Each page had a few clues through that you could use to try and solve the mystery.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I wish I\u2019d never read<\/p>\n

Say Cheese and Die! (Goosebumps #4) by RL Stine. That shit spooked me out for years as a kid! <\/p>\n

Fiction or non-fiction<\/p>\n

Non-fiction, hard. I wish it were different but it speaks to what an unimaginative miser I really am.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The book that haunts me<\/p>\n

Lolita. Enough said!\u00a0<\/p>\n

The book that made me cry<\/p>\n

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings\u00a0by Maya Angelou.<\/p>\n

The book I never admit I\u2019ve read<\/p>\n

Infinite Jest. I love David Foster Wallace\u2019s non-fiction, but this tome was just too much. I lived in New York for several years, and every time I saw people reading it on the subway I\u2019d wonder if they were really just posing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If I could only read three books for the rest of my life they would be<\/p>\n

AA Gill is Away by Adrian Gill.\u00a0It\u2019s brutish and beautiful. He gave all his work by dictation, and when reading him, more than any other writer, I slip into that glorious place where I\u2019m totally unaware of anything around me.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Raiders of the Deep by Lowell Thomas. The man who brought TE Lawrence to global prominence also wrote an extraordinary book documenting the experience of German submariners in the first world war.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. You\u2019ve gotta have a laugh.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ThreeLynley Dodd, Joy Cowley and Margaret Mahy: three of Jack Tame\u2019s great Aotearoa writers.
\nEncounter with an author<\/p>\n

I interviewed Karl Ove Knausgaard once and had a coffee with him afterwards. As we sat there, I couldn\u2019t stop imagining him analysing the situation and recording every minute detail, \u00e0 la My Struggle. The rim of the tulip cup, the leg of the table, the mauve ceiling panels\u2026 etc.<\/p>\n

Greatest New Zealand writer<\/p>\n

Lynley Dodd. I have a toddler, and over the past 18 months I\u2019ve come to properly appreciate the genius of her work. The language is so joyous! Not to mention the illustrations\u2026 ! Between them, Dodd, Joy Cowley and Margaret Mahy have delighted generations of people. What an amazing gift.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Welcome to The Spinoff Books Confessional, in which we get to know the reading habits of Aotearoa writers,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530307,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[489,261780,111,139,69,213,2507],"class_list":["post-530306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-books","tag-jack-tame","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-sports","tag-the-spinoff-books-confessional"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}