“A multilayered, highly informative and insightful book that blends memoir, historical and travel narrative…vivid and meticulously researched.”—San Francisco Chronicle In this involving, compassionate memoir, Christina Thompson tells the story of her romance and eventual marriage to a Maori man, interspersing it with a narrative history of the cultural collision between Westerners and the Maoris of New Zealand.
Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
In this unusual hybrid of history and memoir, Harvard Review editor Thompson examines the historical collisions between Westerners and Maoris through the lens of her marriage to a Maori man. As an American grad student in Australia, Thompson met her husband-to-be, known as Seven, while on vacation in New Zealand. She was petite, blonde and intellectual; he was large, dark and working-class. Yet within a short time, they had married and started a family. Their relationship, and her scholarship, took them back and forth across the Pacific, until they finally settled in her family's New England home outside Boston. Thompson's deep knowledge of the history of Europeans in the Pacific allows her to trace the misunderstandings and stereotypes that have marked perceptions of Polynesians up to the present day. A sensitive observer and polished stylist, Thompson is never dully tendentious or dogmatic. The narrative moves smoothly by way of well-told anecdotes both personal and historical. At times, Thompson covers so much territory—there's a stray chapter about her family's interactions with Native Americans in Minnesota—that it can feel like she's trying to do too much, yet her prose never disappoints. Seven, the man at the center of the book, remains pleasingly opaque, as if Thompson is saying that we can never know completely even those we love best. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Review
"A thing of beauty...enjoyable and descriptive. Thompson manages in her memoir to do what good fiction does [and] this book will certainly entertain those who want to learn more about Pacific island history."--Tampa Tribune
"A multilayered, highly informative and insightful book that blends memoir, historical and travel narrative ... Thompson's prose is highly refined and dispassionately elegant, resulting in a Chekhovian clarity and restraint that in places possesses a poetic lucidity." --San Francisco Chronicle
"[A] fine account. Her observations about the enduring effects of colonization [are] penetrating. She puts her vantage point of insider-outsider to good effect, tracing the genealogy of racial stereotypes and cutting through some of New Zealand's most cherished myths about itself." --New York Times Book Review
"At heart a love story, /Come On Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All/ is a moving examination of exploration ... and the way our travels into remote places on Earth can become travels into the remote places in our hearts and souls."--Philadelphia Inquirer
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
24 of 27 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
As an American transplant to New Zealand, I have to say that I found Christina Thompson's book an absolutely fascinating read. And as the author of two books on New Zealand myself (the second one a work-in-progress), I have to say that her volume has add immeasurably to my effort to understand, not only the historic Maori, but Maori today. I can also appreciate her cross cultural experience via marriage, being that my wife was born and raised in France. If Pakeha--Europeans--have historically viewed Maori with some ambiguity, I can testify to the fact that my French in-laws view me in a similar fashion. To put it politely they see me as a creature only a generation off the frontier that doesn't even know how to use a knife and fork properly--the French version of a savage, one might say. Ms. Thompson's Maori in-laws, on the other hand, impress me as being my idea of what in-laws should be. (I hope my mother-in-law doesn't read this.)
I have only one complaint about this book, and that is that I found the lack of signposts disorienting. That is to say that the reader has no way of knowing when Ms. Thompson's journey began. Was it in the 1960s, 1970s, or 1980s? Except for that omission, I would have to give this book five stars.
I have only one complaint about this book, and that is that I found the lack of signposts disorienting. That is to say that the reader has no way of knowing when Ms. Thompson's journey began. Was it in the 1960s, 1970s, or 1980s? Except for that omission, I would have to give this book five stars.
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I picked up this book at my local bookstore and could not put it down. Thompson's book mixes memoir with historic research to create a very accessible and interesting book. She smoothly combines her research on the literature of colonial-Maori contact with her own story of how she met and married her Maori husband. One of the best books on the contacts between very different cultures that I have read in a long time. And it will make you want to go to New Zealand too.
41 of 52 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Ms. Thompson makes a good point in her book, saying that she always got the feeling that `she never quite got what was going on in NZ.' Unfortunately she went on to write this book anyway, and that is regrettable.
There are two parts to this book, history and memoir. The history is narrow and it tends to focus on sensational (exotic?) aspects that might appeal to an American audience, like shrunken heads and tattooed faces. For anyone interested in a broader account of NZ history, Michael King's `The Penguin History or New Zealand' is the best place to start. The memoir aspect should be a little more interesting for US readers - after all, it's unusual for someone from Boston to marry someone from NZ, let alone a Maori.
Not content to frame NZ concepts in American language for her audience, Ms Thompson told her story of NZ through US cultural lenses. This caused her to interpret things incorrectly. Two examples are; Firstly, when she first arrived in NZ she was looking for signs of where Maori might live - presumably so she could visit them and experience their culture (as if they were separate from the rest of the population like native Americans?) The concept of `finding where Maori live' is as absurd as visiting a reservation or plantation to see native Americans or blacks. If she wanted to find Maori, driving into the first suburb she spotted would have been the best place to start.
Second, her `fury' that her husband was `directed' into trade school (rather than university) because he was Maori is ridiculous. Trade schools, apprenticeships and polytechs (community colleges) offer training for highly valued and well paid jobs in NZ. Skilled trades people are important to the economy and ALL school children are exposed to those options in high school. Due to geographic isolation, those jobs must come from within NZ's population - there is no pool of cheap labor over the border from which to draw. Unlike America, most NZ families do not expect, or even hope, that their children will go to university (even in 2008).
The book also includes observations that are wrong, annoying or generalized. Ms Thompson implies that NZ'ers believe their racial integration is evidence that there is no racism in NZ. That is incorrect. Of course racism exists in NZ, as it does in any society with more than one ethnic population. But integration has resulted in good race relations, which is an important achievement (particularly when you compare it to neighboring Australia or race relations around the world). Her constant use of the words Maori, Pakeha and Half-Caste is annoying. Those terms are not used by NZ'ers to describe each other in 2008 and may even be considered offensive. NZ is a multi-cultural melting pot and those terms are no longer relevant. Her description of the coffee that `Seven's' family drinks is generalized to the entire country implying a lack of sophistication. NZ is an espresso mecca. I focus on it because when I came to the US I drove my husband mad trying to find a decent cappuccino.
From my perspective the book missed all the wonderful subtlety and complexity of NZ. Ms. Thompson should have stuck closer to home in her choice of topic. There are two things that make me sad about this book 1) American's who might be thinking of visiting NZ will read it and think its an accurate portrayal, and 2) that it might be published in NZ. While I am not generally in favor of book-banning, I might make an exception here : )
There are two parts to this book, history and memoir. The history is narrow and it tends to focus on sensational (exotic?) aspects that might appeal to an American audience, like shrunken heads and tattooed faces. For anyone interested in a broader account of NZ history, Michael King's `The Penguin History or New Zealand' is the best place to start. The memoir aspect should be a little more interesting for US readers - after all, it's unusual for someone from Boston to marry someone from NZ, let alone a Maori.
Not content to frame NZ concepts in American language for her audience, Ms Thompson told her story of NZ through US cultural lenses. This caused her to interpret things incorrectly. Two examples are; Firstly, when she first arrived in NZ she was looking for signs of where Maori might live - presumably so she could visit them and experience their culture (as if they were separate from the rest of the population like native Americans?) The concept of `finding where Maori live' is as absurd as visiting a reservation or plantation to see native Americans or blacks. If she wanted to find Maori, driving into the first suburb she spotted would have been the best place to start.
Second, her `fury' that her husband was `directed' into trade school (rather than university) because he was Maori is ridiculous. Trade schools, apprenticeships and polytechs (community colleges) offer training for highly valued and well paid jobs in NZ. Skilled trades people are important to the economy and ALL school children are exposed to those options in high school. Due to geographic isolation, those jobs must come from within NZ's population - there is no pool of cheap labor over the border from which to draw. Unlike America, most NZ families do not expect, or even hope, that their children will go to university (even in 2008).
The book also includes observations that are wrong, annoying or generalized. Ms Thompson implies that NZ'ers believe their racial integration is evidence that there is no racism in NZ. That is incorrect. Of course racism exists in NZ, as it does in any society with more than one ethnic population. But integration has resulted in good race relations, which is an important achievement (particularly when you compare it to neighboring Australia or race relations around the world). Her constant use of the words Maori, Pakeha and Half-Caste is annoying. Those terms are not used by NZ'ers to describe each other in 2008 and may even be considered offensive. NZ is a multi-cultural melting pot and those terms are no longer relevant. Her description of the coffee that `Seven's' family drinks is generalized to the entire country implying a lack of sophistication. NZ is an espresso mecca. I focus on it because when I came to the US I drove my husband mad trying to find a decent cappuccino.
From my perspective the book missed all the wonderful subtlety and complexity of NZ. Ms. Thompson should have stuck closer to home in her choice of topic. There are two things that make me sad about this book 1) American's who might be thinking of visiting NZ will read it and think its an accurate portrayal, and 2) that it might be published in NZ. While I am not generally in favor of book-banning, I might make an exception here : )
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All: A New Zealand Story
I have been to New Zealand a couple of times and found the book very interesting. The native people are very friendly and this comes across in the book. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Alice
history, sociology, and SELF-INDULGENCE
This otherwise intelligent writer combines some less trumpeted aspects of New Zealand'sa early history, a bit of Maori culture and sociology, and a dull, very pedestrian narrative... Read more
Published 2 months ago by a fellow writer
A great read as part of my trip to NZ
I really enjoyed reading this book and it was a helpful part of my vacation in New Zealand, I was able to cross reference some of the things she wrote about in the book with some... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Shaula Massena
Will there be more?
I liked this book a lot, but as I got towards the final chapters I realized that Christina Thompson has just whetted our appetites. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Anne Salazar
A New Zealand STORY
Note to all that this is not supposed to be a history of NZ. The subtitle is "A New Zealand Story," not A New Zealand History. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Emilie K. Ross
good book
This is a very good read. I originally wanted to learn about Maori culture, which it had a little on, but it is really a sort of mini-autobiography on a woman who marries a Maori... Read more
Published 13 months ago by passerculus
As fascinating as the title suggests
I began reading this book, not knowing what to expect. The title was a bit off-putting, and I had read a review that warned readers off in no uncertain terms. Read more
Published 18 months ago by labfs39
Tasty
What a joy this book is... a great melding of historical analysis and modern cultural insight.
Christina Thompson, a scholar and the editor of the Harvard Review, was on... Read more
Christina Thompson, a scholar and the editor of the Harvard Review, was on... Read more
Published 21 months ago by Wildness
New Zealand Primer
I ordered this book as a possible introduction to the history and culture of New Zealand even though it is fiction, as we were going to make the trip. Read more
Published 22 months ago by Shelbi
A know-nothing writes a nothing book
This American person trades on the fact she has a Maori husband. Her knowledge of Maoridom - past or present- is infinitesimal. Read more
Published 23 months ago by K. Hulme
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