{"id":584616,"date":"2026-08-30T04:50:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T04:50:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/584616\/"},"modified":"2026-08-30T04:50:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T04:50:09","slug":"on-the-up-kerikeri-writer-irene-gottlieb-named-international-author-of-the-year-finalist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/584616\/","title":{"rendered":"On The Up: Kerikeri writer Irene Gottlieb named International Author of the Year finalist"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIt was just a hobby. I had a knack for it, but I\u2019d never written creatively before. <\/p>\n

\u201cThings have ticked along, and I realised there\u2019s something here.\u201d <\/p>\n

Gottlieb was born and raised in New York and spent most of her life in Colorado. <\/p>\n

She has lived in Kerikeri<\/a> for nearly six years. <\/p>\n

She writes under the pen name Rachel Old after stepping off the corporate ladder a decade ago and feeling unsure of calling herself an author. <\/p>\n

Jandals is the first in a trilogy centred on \u201ca museum in a war\u201d. It is written as contemporary historical fiction for young adults. <\/p>\n

Though the book was published in 2016, she never did anything with it \u2013 until recently, when she sent it to the International Impact Book Awards. <\/p>\n

The awards are a global platform recognising indie, self-published and traditionally published authors whose books deliver a powerful message and create real-world impact. <\/p>\n

\u201cI received a letter of congratulations that I\u2019d won for contemporary fiction in February, and I went to Phoenix [for the annual gala awards]. <\/p>\n

\u201cThen the call came a couple of months after that saying I\u2019d been nominated for Author of the Year. Then they said I was a finalist.\u201d <\/p>\n

Gottlieb is now preparing herself for the red-carpet event. <\/p>\n

Though shy, she wants to do justice to her book. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m interested in making sure I elevate this and stay brave because I\u2019m pretty reserved. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut it\u2019s about the story … I wrote this for a reason because I know it\u2019s making a difference.\u201d <\/p>\n

Jandals is a story of curious college students who meet in Amsterdam and accidentally help to change or save the world.<\/p>\n

Its theme was to prove that \u201cwith patience and compassion, peace prevails\u201d, Gottlieb said. <\/p>\n

She wrote the book in Florida over one summer in 2015. <\/p>\n

She previously helped to write treatments for the documentaries Bullfighter on the Green and Bell Rung. <\/p>\n

Jandals now has a social media following of more than 5400 young people around the world. <\/p>\n

Gottlieb hopes to finish her second book next year. <\/p>\n

Jenny Ling is a senior journalist at the Northern Advocate. She has a special interest in covering human interest stories, along with finance, roading, and social issues. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt was just a hobby. I had a knack for it, but I\u2019d never written creatively before. \u201cThings…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":584617,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[13851,10779,2108,156,41550,287747,23500,1019,196342,16571,10136,111,139,1067,69,1118,90,223,2044,810,1965,379],"class_list":["post-584616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-author","tag-awards","tag-book","tag-entertainment","tag-finalist","tag-gottlieb","tag-impact","tag-international","tag-irene","tag-kerikeri","tag-named","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-northland","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-on","tag-the","tag-time","tag-up","tag-writer","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584616","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=584616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/584617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=584616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=584616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=584616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}