First Chapters

Note: Entries for 2010 are closed.

First Chapters - Ngā Wāhanga Tuatahi is now its fourth successful year of operation. This coaching programme, formerly known as Writer in Manukau Libraries (WIML), provides an opportunity for local emerging writers to receive one-on-one coaching from already successful and established authors.

Past authors have included:

Find out about more about First Chapters.

Write Around Manukau

The Write Around Manukau workshops are presented by Manukau Libraries and the NZ Society of Authors, and are funded by Manukau Libraries and the Creative Communities NZ Manukau City Scheme.

Workshops cover topics such as:

Introduction to life writing
Short-story writing
Writing for children and teenagers
Storytelling/storywriting
Self-publishing - perils, pitfalls and profits
Poetry - urban, natural and personal landscapes
Introduction to screenwriting.

Writing competitions

Library Week Twext Tales competition

Become a Twitterati sensation, write a stunning piece of Twitterature and win New Zealand’s first official e-reader: the Kobo. The competition requires entrants to be especially inventive: the composition of short stories in Twitter style; with strict limits on the amount of text.

For Library Week 2010 (August 16 – 22) Manukau Libraries offered a Twittertastic short-story writing competition with a twist… and a tweet!!!

Read the winning entry.

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'Watermelon' short story competition

'Watermelon' is a Manukau Libraries initiative supporting NZ Book Month 2009. The original story appeared in the NZ Listener, June 27, 1987 and author J.B. Ringer states that "'Watermelon' is set in a real place, Waitangi Falls, near Waiuku, where I grew up. The story pieces together a few fragments of adolescent memory. It's over to the reader to decide how real these are."

Read the online short story or view the pdf version.