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Bonsai: Best small stories from Aotearoa New Zealand
‘Bonsai� brings together a pioneering collection of flash fiction and associated forms (prose poetry and haibun) from 165 writers in Aotearoa New Zealand, along with intriguing essays on this increasingly popular genre. In 200 small stories of no more than 300 words, where the translucent boundaries between prose and poetry are often transgressed, we discover a vast array of human experience. Here, children race snails, shoot tin cans, learn to fly, and look for Antarctica in a drain pipe, while Schrödinger’s cat dreams of life and death, a dog licks away a woman’s tears, and a peacock guards its human family. Family tensions spill over during trips to the beach, couples get together and fall apart, babies are born � or not born � and parents die. You might find yourself dancing like the cool kids, listening to a neighbour sing in the dark, or watching a tractor catch fire. There are perfect moments in miniature as dew falls on a spider’s web and strangers make eye contact. Composed with precision in a form where every word counts, these carefully chiselled works are provocative, tender and endlessly surprising.
- GenresShort Stories
293 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2018
3 people are currently reading
144 people want to read
About the author
Michelle Elvy
23Ìýbooks13ÌýfollowersA Pushcart nominee, a Watson Fellow, a Fulbright Scholar, a three-time finalist in the Glass Woman international writing competition, Michelle is also the recipient of a New Zealand Society of Authors/Auckland Museum Library grant and a New Zealand Society of Authors mentorship grant. In 2016, she was also short-listed for the Grimshaw Sargeson Fellowship for her novel draft, and her story ‘Lost and Found in Berlinâ€� placed second in the Nivalis Short Story Competition.
Her poetry, fiction, travel writing, creative nonfiction and reviews have been widely published, most recently in The Feminine Divine (Cynren Press 2019), New Micro (W.W. Norton 2018), Ofi Press (2016-2018), Manifesto: 101 Political Poems from Aotearoa New Zealand (Otago University Press 2017) and Borderlands & Crossroads: Writing the Motherland (Demeter Press 2016).
Her poetry, fiction, travel writing, creative nonfiction and reviews have been widely published, most recently in The Feminine Divine (Cynren Press 2019), New Micro (W.W. Norton 2018), Ofi Press (2016-2018), Manifesto: 101 Political Poems from Aotearoa New Zealand (Otago University Press 2017) and Borderlands & Crossroads: Writing the Motherland (Demeter Press 2016).
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 9, 2024
Big variety of short stories, most of which I really enjoyed and some of which I have bookmarked to teach. I enjoyed the insightful essays as well.
March 18, 2025
I found this book to be useless the author made so many punctuation and is written in a goofy ahhhhhhhhhhh way!!! You must stop writers like this being published lwk.
March 10, 2019
A wonderful collection of flash fiction. Something to dip into time and time again for inspiration.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
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