Bug Week And Other Stories – Airini Beautrais

Read for NZ Book Awards

From 1960s Wellington to post-Communist Germany, Bug Week is a collection of short stories that traverses the weird, the wry and the grotesque fragments of people’s lives.

There are bug collectors, necrophiliacs, an albatross at an open mic night, and body parts washed up on a river bank. The social settings and voices are never the same, rather the stories showcase a varied and authentic collection of characters, relaying unexpected stories of human relationships. Despite the focus on the cynical and perverse, there is an element of comedy amongst the tragedy.

⫸ “I have some kind of weird resistance to short stories in general – maybe too much analysis in sixth form at school rather than reading for pleasure? So I started Bug Week with a bit of trepidation. I wasn’t just pleasantly surprised, but genuinely enjoyed these beautifully written stories.

“Often a gentle tone would lead into an unexpectedly grim event however as a reader I continued to be drawn into a story and lulled into a rhythm only for a turn of events to throw things off balance. This was never jarring in a way that made for an unpleasant reading experience, it was done perfectly. 

“I tried to guess which of my colleagues would play the starring roles of the eponymous Bug Week and for that I can only apologise to them. I also do need to mention the final story which probably goes down as The Worst Short Story I Have Ever Read.” – Suzy

⫸ “Bug Week is a good example of why I don’t often read short stories. Just as I fall in love with the story and become emotionally invested in the characters, it is over. I get new book apprehension and end-of-book despair repeatedly and the mid-story joy doesn’t long last enough. I know this is a bit of a backhanded compliment, in that I enjoyed the book so much it annoyed me there wasn’t more to enjoy, but this is my usual reaction to excellent short story collections. I will add that this is one of my favourite ever short story collections and I would strongly recommend it.

“I felt connected to each and every story in this collection; they were engaging, connected and piqued my interest instantly. My favourite story was The Baddest Toroa In Town in which an albatross takes the stage at open-mic night, interrupts a poetry recital by a fisherman and urges the crowd to stop plundering the oceans. While funny and slightly absurd it makes the point that art is often a more effective medium for societal and political messaging than formal appeals to the higher ups. 

“Beautrais has a knack for conveying a maximum amount of content in a minimal amount of words and has an appealing wry humour. The characters are structured in identifiable Kiwi ways, their social quirks and their chill, no-nonsense tone. And the New Zealand settings anchor the narratives geographically and historically. Even the German-set stories gave me a NZ Lit vibe in that they reminded me of Katherine Mansfield’s In A German Pension, in which she had a satirical focus on the grotesque behaviours of ordinary people.” – Rachel

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Published 2020
VUP
184 pages