Last November, Auckland journalist Braunias added to his 50-plus national writing awards by scooping the Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Non-Fiction for Missing Persons, a terrific collection of a dozen extraordinary tales of disappearance and death. While Braunias has veered across magazines, newspapers, and books, from arts writing to travel, sports, food, and more, he has a particular knack for ‘court reporting as literature’.

His third and final crime collection, The Survivors, is further evidence of Braunias’s talent and storytelling mastery. From the bookending tales of an itinerant and impoverished old man who’d fled a life as a 1970s German intellectual, to the senseless violence of two Chinese migrants whose lives are upturned by a misunderstanding, a would-be arsonist who burns himself to death, or a getaway driver for a cop killer, Braunias soaks us in small details and acute observations, providing a window into unseen lives. Not so much the humanity behind headlines, as stories often overlooked.

Despite digging into some extremely dark areas of humanity, including the Holocaust (Braunias grappling with a 42-volume set of Nuremberg trial transcripts), The Survivors never reads as too bleak thanks to Braunias’s masterful writing, and many touches of humanity and light. An act of mercy. A cheerful trolley jockey. The Singing Cowboy.

A superb collection from a superb storyteller.

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

One of the most popular writers in New Zealand, Steve Braunias is also an in-demand public speaker. He has long practised the art of creative non-fiction and brings a quick wit from page to stage, where he is confident as either a panellist, chair, or featured speaker.

As a journalist and author, Steve has won over 40 national writing awards including best columnist, arts writer (three times), travel writer (three times), sports writer (twice), crime writer, and food writer. Steve Braunias is the literary editor of Newsroom’s books section ReadingRoom, a noted writer at the NZ Herald, and the author of 10 books. he is a staff writer for the NZ Herald and also serves as literary editor for the New Zealand current affairs website Newsroom.