New Novel From Indian-Portuguese Kiwi Writer

July sees the publication of Franciska Soares’ second novel, A Smatter of Minutes. Soares is a Kiwi author of Portuguese and Indian heritage who has lived in both India and Aotearoa New Zealand.

Haunted by the memory of her parent’s murders, Abigail Moore’s life is shaped by a nebulous feeling of guilt. While only a toddler, she had been packed off from Aotearoa to India to stay with her loving grandmother, Gramme Kathleen, in a small close-knit Roman Catholic community on Gloriosa Street, Mumbai.

On Gramme’s death, Abigail is set adrift once more and decides to return to Aotearoa, where she is reunited with her half-brothers and starts to question her childhood memories.

Earlier this year Soares, who lives in Queenstown, also published her first collection of poetry. Quiet Enough charts her journey from the noise to the quiet, following Soares’ hearing loss.

Literary agent Laurie Chittenden says of A Smatter of Minutes: “Franciska Soares has composed a nuanced, powerful novel that touches all the senses as it moves from New Zealand to India and back. Layer by layer, we discover the truth behind one night that forever changed the lives of one woman and her patchwork family.”

Kiwi author Dr Lauren Roche says Soares has “an extraordinary vocabulary and a lot of esoteric knowledge. Gloriosa Street is chaotic and bright, swamped with sound and smell and vision and noise and tastes. The characters are diverse and wonderful.”

International author Elizabeth Bruce says: “I was immediately struck by the wonderfully perceptive and engaging nature of the writing. There’s a personal and relatable—and, at times, even humorous—quality to the prose that reverberates off the page.”

A Smatter of Minutes is available now in print, as an e-book and as an audiobook.

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