Green Grey Rain

Rain on iron rooftops. A radio streaming the latest hit songs. It’s the early 1950s. The baby boom. Valarie is a talkative, singing, slanging, pregnant daughter of the slums. Gilbert, her husband, is a well-spoken son of a landed family. They already have three kids. Gilbert has just taken a job as paymaster at a coal mine. The family is about to start life in a green and black and red township on the West Coast. A little boy is born, almost in a taxi, and named Stevan.

Green Grey rain tells the story of the first years of a little boy dreaming and singing, wondering and wishing, in the bush, rain, rust and sooty streets of 1950s Blackball. A story told by the boy. A story told too by the hit songs he hears on the radio. And a story told by his mother – someone who, with her sister, has already spoken to us in the pages of Oracles and Miracles.

Stevan is one of New Zealand’s most prolific writers with 24 books published (including histories, novels, and true tales) and numerous articles, essays, and short stories. He is an award-winning author, a best-selling author, yet still a humble and engaging author.