There hasn’t been much news over the past few days, as you may have noticed, but there are some reviews to report on.

The Herald has run a piece on Ian Cross' 1957 landmark novel The God Boy, which has been repackaged and elevated to Penguin Modern Classics status. The only other Kiwi author to achieve such an accolade is Katherine Mansfield, with The Garden Party and Other Stories.

Margie Thomson finds The God Boy worth a second look:

The great benefit of ploys like this is that an old book can be brought, all freshened-up, to a brand new audience. Certainly, reading The God Boy nearly half a century after its original publication, one is struck by its simple power and the timelessness of its themes (marriage gone wrong, the vulnerability of children, teenage turmoil, the inability of faith to compensate for betrayal), while also encapsulating the narrow-minded tightness, the inarticulateness of small-town New Zealand at that time.

For more information on Ian Cross, check out Denis Welch’s piece from a couple of weeks ago in the Listener.