Maori
by Alan Dean Foster
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Description
A thrilling historical novel that follows an English family through five decades of passion, adventure, war, and upheaval in the breathtaking wilderness of nineteenth-century New Zealand The only son of a poor British coal miner, Robert Coffin sets sail for the far ends of the Earth in search of his fortune, leaving his young bride and infant child behind in England. In the sordid and dangerous South Pacific port of Kororareka, on the sprawling island the native Maori call "the Land of show more the Long White Cloud," Coffin builds a successful new life as a merchant. He gains an unwavering respect for the aboriginal people and their culture, and finds comfort in the arms of his fiery Irish mistress, Mary. But the unexpected arrival of a China-bound clipper bearing his wife, Holly, and son, Christopher, throws Coffin's world into turmoil-compounded by the ever-increasing tension between the Maori tribes and the mistrusted "pakehas" who are plundering their land. As the years of a volatile nineteenth century progress, the indomitable family of the stalwart adventurer the Maori have named "Iron Hair" will struggle, sacrifice, and endure through war, chaos, catastrophe, and change. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
This book is what you expect - white men, natives, a clash between their cultures. It is not up to par with other epics I have read. It is a sum of facts overrun by fiction. There were some interesting parts about the Maori culture but it was mainly about English settlers and greed. I found that most of the characters had a violent ending. When I attempted to anticipate where the story was heading, I was always on the wrong track. The story moves along at a fast pace, right up to a disaster at the end.
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Author Information
364+ Works 73,775 Members
Bestselling science fiction writer Alan Dean Foster was born in New York City in 1946, but raised mainly in California. He received a B.A. in Political Science from UCLA in 1968, and a M.F.A. in 1969. Foster enjoys traveling because it gives him opportunities to meet new people and explore new places and cultures. This interest is carried over to show more his writing, but with a twist: the new places encountered in his books are likely to be on another planet, and the people may belong to an alien race. Foster began his career as an author when a letter he sent to Arkham Collection was purchased by the editor and published in the magazine in 1968. His first novel, The Tar-Aiym Krang, introduced the Humanx Commonwealth, a galactic alliance between humans and an insectlike race called Thranx. Several other novels, including the Icerigger trilogy, are also set in the world of the Commonwealth. The Tar-Aiym Krang also marked the first appearance of Flinx, a young man with paranormal abilities, who reappears in other books, including Orphan Star, For Love of Mother-Not, and Flinx in Flux. Foster has also written The Damned series and the Spellsinger series, which includes The Hour of the Gate, The Moment of the Magician, The Paths of the Perambulator, and Son of Spellsinger, among others. Other books include novelizations of science fiction movies and television shows such as Star Trek, The Black Hole, Starman, Star Wars, and the Alien movies. Splinter of the Mind's Eye, a bestselling novel based on the Star Wars movies, received the Galaxy Award in 1979. The book Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990. His novel Our Lady of the Machine won him the UPC Award (Spain) in 1993. He also won the Ignotus Award (Spain) in 1994 and the Stannik Award (Russia) in 2000. He is the recipient of the Faust, the IAMTW Lifetime achievement award. Alan Dean Foster's Star Wars: The Force Awakens, was a 2015 New York Times bestseller. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Maori
- Original publication date
- 1988-02
- Important places
- New Zealand
Classifications
- Genres
- Fiction and Literature, Historical Fiction, General Fiction, Science Fiction, Fantasy
- DDC/MDS
- 813.54 — Literature & rhetoric American literature in English American fiction in English 1900-1999 1945-1999
- LCC
- PS3556 .O756 — Language and Literature American literature American literature Individual authors 1961-
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 220
- Popularity
- 148,146
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.70)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 6
- ASINs
- 3
