HBRW 2024 - The Bookshop Detectives

There's murder afoot, but whoever's dunnit is no match for bookshop owners and fearless sleuths, Garth and Eloise. Catherine Robertson talks to Garth and Eloise - sorry, Gareth and Louise Ward - about their exceptionally entertaining collaborative debut novel, The Bookshop Detectives: Dead Girl Gone (PS: if you reveal the murderer's name at question time we'll have to kill you.)

Gareth and Louise Ward are the real-life owners of independent bookshop Wardini Books, with stores in Havelock North and Napier, New Zealand.
Louise is known among the staff as Fearless Leader and Gareth as a bit of a dick; he is, however, the author of the Tarquin the Honest and The Rise of the Remarkables book series, as well as being the bestselling and award-winning author of The Traitor and the Thief and The Clockill and the Thief.
Gareth and Louise met at police training college in the UK and are both ex-coppers. Louise has one murder arrest to her name, is an English Literature Graduate and as an ex-teacher inflicted Shakespeare on inner-city twelve-year-olds. She regularly reviews books on RNZ.
Both are obsessed with their rescue dog Stevie, avoid housework and gardening, and live in the cultural centre of the universe that is Hawke’s Bay, Aotearoa New Zealand.
The Bookshop Detectives is Gareth and Louise’s first book together.

Chair: Catherine Robertson

Catherine Robertson is a #1 New Zealand bestselling author, best known for her Gabriel’s Bay trilogy and the children's picture book Pearl in a Whirl, illustrated by Fifi Colston. Catherine is a regular guest on Jesse Mulligan’s Book Critic slot on RNZ, and is current chair of the Hawke’s Bay Readers & Writers Trust. The first two books in Catherine’s debut spicy contemporary romance series are out now.

Don't miss Catherine in her session 'In the Pink' with Danielle Hawkins and Nicky Pellegrino on Sun 20 Oct, 4pm.