James George — Hummingbird

Huia Publishers 2006 Paperback, 360pp. In this, James George\'s extraordinary second novel, three people, strangers all, are thrown together in a world of sand and ocean and sky on Northland\'s Ninety Mile Beach. Jordan - a tattooed man who lives alone at the base of his ancestral hill in a boat that was never launched - has his solitude broken by the arrival of two travellers: one who falls from the air, another who arrives following childhood tracks. Kingi, a distinguished Battle of Britain veteran, is journeying to keep a promise made on Crete half a century ago. Kataraina, a former prostitute, has left Sydney\'s Kings Cross and is finally travelling home. But their journeys and their lives change forever with the arrival of a young woman and her daughter ā¦ This novel sets global conflict against a sensuous search for love. The action sweeps across fifty years, and ranges around the globe from New Zealand to northern Europe and the Mediterranean. Hummingbird is a bittersweet exploration of freedom and confinement, parenthood and family, home and belonging. Some foxing to text block edges. (ISBN: 9781877283666). Good.