Parrot Heaven is a sequel to 2022’s A Runner’s Guide to Rakiura, which sees the New Yorker, runner and writer, Maudie assigned to write a guide to Stewart Island’s running trails.
But Maudie never writes the guide to Rakiura’s trails, instead becoming absorbed in a treasure hunt in which clues are solved during the meditative process of running.
In Parrot Heaven, Maudie finds herself a new mystery to solve - a crime is committed in the tiny island community, and her father-in-law is the accused - but she is suffering, both with the loss of a pet, and with an injury that prevents her from running.
“I was interested in what happens when whatever you do that keeps you sane - it doesn’t have to be running - gets taken away from you,” Ms Kany said.
‘‘So I took that away from her and still presented her with a whole bunch of problems and mysteries to solve, and I wanted to see what happened to her mentally and physically as she tries to get back to running while also dealing with her life.”
For Ms Kany, herself a runner from New York who spent 20 years living on Stewart Island, the combination of literary themes in the book, and the exploration of the world through the lens of running, is a “very Wānaka” story.
‘‘And since I moved up here, one of the things I’ve loved about the community is just how bookish, and how literary it is.
‘‘So there’s a real cross-section in the book of running and reading, and I think that’s very Wānaka,” Ms Kany said.
The themes should appeal to Wānaka locals, and it is Wānaka locals who have put the book together.
Ms Kany moved to Wānaka from Stewart Island when her oldest child reached high school age.
The final edits of the book’s manuscript were completed at Rhyme x Reason brewery, in Gordon Rd, copy-editing was done by a member of Howard Kany’s book club, Iona Bentley, and the artwork was done by Howard Kany’s Albert Town neighbour, Sharon Parker.
The title - Parrot Heaven - is derived from its Stewart Island setting, but also serves to explore a question plaguing the main character of where our pets go when they die.
‘‘When people go to Stewart Island, they’ll often say, ‘Oh my gosh, this place is paradise,’ and a lot of the reason that people talk about Stewart Island that way is because of the birdlife there.
‘‘But then there’s also a more literal part, which is to ask what happens to a pet, say, a parrot, when it dies?
“And that’s something that’s quietly tormenting Maudie because she doesn’t want to talk about it out loud with the backdrop of every horrible thing that’s happening in the world, and it seems really ridiculous to be sad about your dead pet,” Ms Kany said.
