Greta and Valdin

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The publisher says: “Reilly’s exploration of love, family, queerness, migration, karaoke, the generational reverberations of colonialism and the disturbing realisation that your parents have a past will have readers falling in love with Greta, Valdin, and all of the Vladisavljevics.”

I have a jeweller friend who talks about the types of materials she likes to work with — primarily steel, copper and brass. She doesn’t use gold or precious stones. I think like that with words. I use the steel and copper and brass of language. They’re my materials and I love them and never tire of working with them. The Vladisavljevic family can never remember “white people names,” Greta observing,“I know I can remember Sina, Min, Ashford and J-soek, but there’s no way I’m going to remember Kieran,” while her friend Elliot gets called “Greg” for a whole day. Racism, sexism and homophobia are all examined here in ways that make you think, sometimes cringe but mostly laugh, due to Reilly’s dry, acerbic tone which manages to also be warm and generous. Greta and Valdinis a complete world. I was totally captivated. It is warm and funny, inventive and charming, with a genuine and earned tenderness at its heart.' —Kate Duignan, author of The New Shipsand BreakwaterRebecca K Reilly’s debut novel, Greta & Valdin, originally published in the author’s native New Zealand, is being brought to the UK by Hutchinson Heinemann.

Gallic Books have this whole Francophile thing going on and also have an eclectic mix of a few Kiwi novels – by Chloe Lane, Fiona Kidman, Damien Wilkins. They also have a bookshop. Are they basically a boutique publisher?

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From the moment I first read Pip Adam I found her work incredibly exciting. I love that she doesn’t seem to care about flirting with the reader. I’m a writer who definitely flirts with the reader. Pip is too cool to do that. I want to be that cool but I never will be. I can’t wait to read her new novel this year. Greta and Valdin is a complete world. I was totally captivated. It is warm and funny, inventive and charming, with a genuine and earned tenderness at its heart.' —Kate Duignan, author of The New Ships and Breakwater Among the young audience is Eoin McGlynn, a Year 12 student at Wakatipu High School. Eoin loves reading and writing short fiction and poetry and is excited to be volunteering this weekend alongside his mum Kendall: "From the moment I heard about the Queenstown Writers Festival, I was filled with anticipation. An event with the sole purpose of creating a forum for local creatives to share their work and learn from others in the field is such a wonderful idea." Greta and Valdin follows the titular siblings, Greta and Valdin Vladisavljevic (yes I did misspell that many times even with the book open beside me) as they navigate social and personal issues which are all too relatable for the audience in a world deeply familiar to New Zealand readers.

Reilly said: “It’s a very exciting opportunity for my book to gain a new readership outside my home country and not something I take lightly. I look forward to working with the team at Hutchinson Heinemann and seeing what happens next!” THIS BOOK IS INCREDIBLE! I can't remember the last time I read something that was so genuinely and uniquely funny. Thank YOU for sending this wonderful book my way. I look forward to talking about it with everyone I know! Yes, and no. Yes, because if a publisher gets excited about your book and can envision readers for it in their market then you feel like you must be doing something right. No, because if I need overseas validation to keep writing, I would question my reasons for writing. Having said that, I’m not a writer who would keep writing even if no one anywhere wanted to publish my work. I want readers, and I want to entertain my readers. If no one wanted to publish me anymore, I’d retrain as a DJ, and build an audience of middle-aged women who still want to dance it out to deep house beats. I believe that’s quite a large audience. I laughed, I cried, I cheered with Greta and Valdin. This is a novel that tastes like life." —Margaux Vialleron, author of The Yellow KitchenAn absolute delight. . . a gloriously picaresque celebration of messy, complicated love." —Emma Hughes, author of It’s Complicated With Rebecca’s book, it had such an ebullient nature and was an utter joy to read. So funny and fun, and loving. And these are much more serious moral transgressions than disagreeing with a critic engaging in un-PC ad hominem – ie, last year’s case of Nicholas Reid’s poorly thought-out gripe with essa may ranapiri’s identity and use of they/them pronouns. Regardless, it doesn’t matter what identity grouping is boss because Perez’s gripe is really with literary output. He wrote, “Everything reads and sounds the same [. . .] You’ll never read a story about a pro-lifer or someone unvaccinated.” These topics aren’t the most marketable; a white man can see that too. It’s a shame this cultural trend prevents writers exploring broader topics but Perez is misplacing the blame. Neither Ellen or Perez are the first to complain of this homogeneity. Sit down, actually write and more importantly stop letting your anger overshadow the work; as Meghan Daum has argued, it’s not even “the marketplace that’s ruining literature. It’s the literary citizens themselves.” It's easy for a book to be funny, but hard for it to be funny and passionate and stylish and insightful. Greta & Valdin nails it. It introduces the reader delightfully to its world, which resembles an international convention of fabulous cranks; it trusts us to see the beauty in them, and it rewards our trust. They should invent a lesbian Wes Anderson so that she can film it." —Isaac Fellman, author of Dead Collections