Author(s): Wilkins Damien

NZ Fiction

Amy is a store detective at Cutty's, the oldest and grandest department store in the country. She's good at her job. She can read people and catch them. But Cutty's is closing down. Amy has a young baby, an ailing mother, and a large mortgage. She also has a past as an activist. This compelling novel opens in a police interview room, with Amy narrating the weeks leading up to the chaotic close of Cutty's, a time when the store moves from permanent feature to ruin and when people under stress do strange things. An intense exploration of the moment when the solid ground of a life is taken away, this swiftly told novel shows again how unerringly and vividly Damien Wilkins traces the stress fractures of contemporary living. Cover by Jonathan King.

Right off the bat I enjoyed this story. The writing style is quick paced, colloquial and not weighed down by unnecessary detail. Amy is a young undercover security officer working for Cutty's department store in Wellington. She has recently returned from maternity leave, she lives with her husband in a cold and slightly decaying house in a nondescript Wellington suburb, but her life has not always been so suburban. The book focuses on the events of the week leading up to the closing of the Cutty's store, things are failing apart and as the book progresses we realise something has gone very wrong for Amy.If you have ever spent any time at a department store such as Kirkcaldie and Stains you will instantly recognize the quaint setting Wilkins is evoking in Lifting.Having worked for K&S myself I felt Wilkins captured the microcosm of society that exists within a department store perfectly; the hierarchy, the cliques, the customers and the famous doormen. I really enjoyed this book, it was great to read a piece of contemporary New Zealand fiction that felt relatable.

Gabrielle