To write your life story is to go down into the dark and steamy kitchen of the soul, to lift the lids of the cooking pots and examine the contents, one by one…

Lauris Edmond completed her remarkable three-volume autobiography in the early 1990s. It tells the story of a Hawkes Bay childhood in an unconventional home, wartime years as a student in Wellington, motherhood and teaching in country towns.

And then Lauris Edmond’s ‘second life’ began, when she became an award-winning poet of international standing – a life that she describes, however, as no more real nor more important than that earlier one.

Endorsements                                              

'Lauris Edmond is now an internationally known recorder of New Zealand experience. This penetrating narrative, with its grace, clarity, sensitivity and stark honesty, is the equal of her finest poems. We are immeasurably in her debt.' New Zealand Books

'Make no mistake, this is autobiography at its very best, very evocation of period, written with real appreciation of the craftsmanship of writing, and very frank indeed.' Otago Daily Times

'Future generations will be grateful Edmond set her life down; apart from its literary merit, it is an important historical document.' The Listener

Contents                                                       

Author’s note
Note to the second edition
Part One: Hot October
Part Two: Bonfires in the Rain
Part Three: The Quick World
Afterword: Only Connect