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Fiction & Non-fiction

Prose & Poetry

Orion Foote - Poetry

Turns out (just for the record), Orion is of English, Scots, Southern Chinese & Norse persuasion.

English and writing essays were about the only thing he enjoyed at school. He had a marvellous English teacher in his fifth form year, who evidently took a shine to him and encouraged his literary inclinations – he sometimes wonders what became of Miss Freedman.

Orion was a ‘shoo in’ for the writing game – made a ward of the state and placed in foster care in the 1960’s, he preferred the observer role over that of participant. Despite possessing a precocious flair for most sports, the annual school cross country debacle was not his forte.

During his formative teen years, music took centre stage in his life, and later he graduated from the Wellington Conservatorium of Music, majoring in classical guitar performance studies under the tutelage of Matthew Marshall.

In his autumnal years, he picked up his quill again and began to absorb the timeless language of poetry. He has a special interest in Thomas Hardy, and could easily see himself quite happily ensconced in Hardy’s lair at ‘Max Gate’ on the outskirts of Dorchester in Dorset.

Orion also revels in post Great War modernist poetry. Lately, he has enjoyed delving into many contemporary writers & poets – with a special affection for the work of Robert Lowell, David Bromige, Joan Didion, W. G Sebald, Louise Gluck and numerous other American and European literary voices. He keeps a keen eye on New Zealand poetry too, and includes the work of the late Geoff Cochrane as being mildly influential.

He also has a strong interest in many aspects of New Zealand’s cultural/social history, including Chinese and European mixed ancestry, and also New Zealand boxing history. His work has featured in several newspapers, as well as specialist magazines and journals.

He is currently an active member of Nelson Live Poets, and his work has appeared in the Top of the South Branch, NZ Society of Authors anthology series ‘Horizons’ .

©️Orion Foote, 2023

*Photo by ©️Francesca Foote

Having embarked on the journey of becoming a career bureaucrat, Kate abruptly left Wellington on maternity leave, only to re-emerge a few years later as a novelist. Since then, she has segued into short stories, flash fiction, and storylining, and has even been cajoled into co-writing a short play (winning the award for best newcomers at the Nelson Fringe Festival 2020).

Still, primarily a novelist, Kate’s final novel in her Danton Bay urban-fantasy trilogy was published in 2022. Her short stories, and those of seven other fantasy writers from Australasia, have been published in the Down Under Fantasy Anthology.

Since arriving in Nelson around six years ago Orspe has collaborated with local writers and film-makers, leading to contributions to three STEM publications and the production of a short film screenplay, which was selected for the Roswell SciFi Film Festival 2021 and the New York SciFi Film Festival 2022 (though, significantly, failed to win any awards).

Orspe continues to contribute to local film productions as Script Writer/Editor, Assistant Director, Music Score Composer and Sound Assistant.