It’s odd how publishers suddenly have similar book cover ideas – looking at the first and fourth books here – images within a burning page. Reminds me of when I was at school and we had a craze of singeing the edges of our own hand written stories to make them look old. These are two burning mystery thrillers, we also have one Netflix buzz – they have based it on this book series of course – and a very interesting book of Aotearoa night stories – part memoir, part social history and tales from our creatures of the night. And then there is Ruby Tui and her story – one of our favourite rugby wahine, what a star she is.

Growing up in flames / Zach Jones

I've heard of Noah the way you hear about car accidents. A series of whispers, theories and rumours...

Kenna's mother Ava was killed in a bushfire not long ago. Now Kenna's living with her uncle and his young family in the small town where Ava grew up, and she feels like an intruder. Noah's mother has a mental illness that makes him both carer and jailer - constantly watchful, keeping things on an even keel. One night Kenna sees the general store on fire, and a boy standing watching as it burns. It takes her a while to notice he's holding a petrol can, but then things move fast. She's tackled him and run off with his bag before she even knows what's happened. The bag belongs to Noah, and he really wants it back. Kenna wants something too. To make someone else burn the way her mum did. And there's something she doesn't know: how Noah can help her find out the truth about her family. – back cover

After dark / Annette Lees

Every 24 hours, the Earth rolls into its own vast shadow and darkness floods across the land and sea. In a 1600-kilometre-long gliding plumb-line down the length of New Zealand, our beaches, towns, cities, farms, forests, lakes and mountains sink into shadow.

Annette Lees takes us walking into the night of Aotearoa that follows. In the company of bats, owls, moths, singing crickets and seabirds, After Dark guides us from dusk to dawn through a rich and fascinating trove of night stories: tales of war stealth, fireworks and ghosts; nights lit by candles, lanterns, fires and lighthouses; night surfing, night fishing, night diving and night skiing; mountain walking in the dark and night navigation on ocean voyaging waka.

After Dark weaves memoir, social history and unknown tales from the natural world to inspire us to step out the front door at night, where we can shed our day selves and slip easily into a wilder and older world that is waiting there. – Potton & Burton website

The school for good and evil / Soman Chainani

The first kidnappings happened two hundred years before. Some years it was two boys taken, some years two girls, sometimes one of each. But if at first the choices seemed random, soon the pattern became clear. One was always beautiful and good, the child every parent wanted as their own. The other was homely and odd, an outcast from birth. An opposing pair, plucked from youth and spirited away.

This year, best friends Sophie and Agatha are about to discover where all the lost children go: the fabled School for Good & Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. As the most beautiful girl in Gavaldon, Sophie has dreamed of being kidnapped into an enchanted world her whole life. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, she knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil.

But when the two girls are swept into the Endless Woods, they find their fortunes reversed—Sophie’s dumped in the School for Evil to take Uglification, Death Curses, and Henchmen Training, while Agatha finds herself in the School For Good, thrust amongst handsome princes and fair maidens for classes in Princess Etiquette and Animal Communication. But what if the mistake is actually the first clue to discovering who Sophie and Agatha really are? - Good Reads website

All the best liars / Amelia Kahaney

A dark, psychological thriller and coming-of-age story about obsession, manipulation, and the intensity of those first friendships that take hold of you and never let go.

Tic tac toe, three girls in a row. Nine years old and inseparable. Friends for life, or so they think . . .

Best friends Syd, Rain, and Brie grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in the stifling California desert, desperately wishing for a way out.

In the end, each of them will escape—but not in the way they expect. One will do it by dying, another by lying, a third by taking the fall. A deadly fire is set two weeks before the end of their senior year of high school and nothing will ever be the same. -back cover

Straight up / Ruby Tui

Ruby learned to rely on herself and her own strengths as a child, growing up without role models, in an atmosphere of misery and shame. Her extended family did all they could, but it was sport that was the one constant in her childhood, and that pulled her through. Her sporting talent helped her fit in as she was moved from school to school and community to community throughout her childhood. From the age of about eleven, Ruby found herself in some very difficult and dangerous situations and things could have turned out quite differently for her. Fortunately her strength of character and resilience meant that she survived. Not only survived, Ruby made it to university. And it was there that she discovered her love of rugby. From there, her stellar career in rugby took off, firstly in the Black Ferns Sevens team and now playing fifteens for the Chiefs and the New Zealand team. Off the field Ruby is a regular commentator for SKY TV and passionate about healthy environments for Kiwi kids and speaking up about mental health within the sporting community. Impacting change through speaking out about public issues and providing motivation and gratitude to her peers is how she would like to leave her mark. Ruby is the current ambassador for the Headfirst initiative. – Wheelers website

And you can access the library website here at any time to see what else is new, search for items, reading lists and links to Research and Academic databases.