Winner of Best Adult Fiction Book
NZ Booklovers Awards, 2020
The Strength of Eggshells
She’s six feet tall and handles a motorbike like a professional, but Kate has insecurities that match her height and she ignores her past by pushing her fingers into her ears.
Why did her mother Jane only communicate through poetry? What became of her grandmother Meredith who travelled up the Whanganui River on a paddle steamer to marry a returned soldier in an ill-fated valley, beyond the Bridge to Nowhere? And what should Kate do about her own two-pointed love triangle? Somewhere out there are the answers; out where only her motorbike can take her.
The Strength of Eggshells explores the lives of strong rural New Zealanders, set against the fragile isolation of a farm upbringing, two world wars and a landscape that is inevitably slipping beyond reach.
Hi Cloud Ink people, just wanted to drop a quick line to say I've just finished "The strength of eggshells" after having purchased it from Kirsty at the Whangamomona hotel at her book launch. It was amazing, a beautifully crafted story. The unrest and soul-searching which was the central theme left me feeling lost like"Kate" and her family. But the conclusion pulled me back to humanity. Could you please pass on my thanks and congratulations to Kirsty for such an amazing first novel. Regards James Jeffery (the beekeeper with the brightly coloured hives)
This is the best sort of review!! I met this young man and his bee keeping crew out for dinner at the Whangmomona Hotel. Delighted that my book is resonating with the very best of grass roots NZ. – Kirsty
About Kirsty
Kirsty Powell grew up east of Eketahuna in an isolated rural community in the North Wairarapa. She now lives in rural South Auckland and splits her time between farming, writing and contracting as an Occupational Health Physiotherapist to local industries. She has also studied psychology, history, philosophy and completed a Master of Creative Writing. She has travelled by motorbike on several continents and by bicycle across Europe.
The Strength of Eggshells combines many of her loves. She particularly enjoyed researching the history of the returned soldier settlement blocks in the Mangapurua Valley and meeting the descendants and one of the original settlers who is now in her nineties and appears in the novel as herself – a teenage girl in the 1940s.
A message from Kirsty:
A big thank you to every one who attended my Auckland launches. Great to see The Strength of Eggshells at No.3 on the weekly book sellers list!
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Rawene eats holes & Follow the Yellow Froth Road poems published in
Fast Fibres Poetry 7 – from Northland
Fast Fibres Poetry, 2020
Crossing Oceans poem published in
Fresh Ink – Voices Reflecting on COVID-19 from Aotearoa New Zealand
Cloud Ink, 2021
Walking the water poem published in
Fast Fibres Poetry 8 – from Northland
Fast Fibres, 2021
Conversations about slips poems published in
Live encounters presents Aotearoa poets and writers
Live encounters, 2023
