In the Time of the Manaroans (Hardcover)

Miro Bilbrough

ISBN 10: 1776563123 / ISBN 13: 9781776563128

Published by Victoria University of Wellington Press, Wellington, 2020

About this Item

Hardcover. At fourteen Miro Bilbrough falls out with the communist grandmother who has raised her since she was seven, and is sent to live with her father and his rural-hippy friends. It is 1978, Canvastown, New Zealand, and the Floodhouse is a dwelling of pre-industrial gifts and deficiencies set on the banks of the Wakamarina River, which routinely invades its rooms.Isolated in rural poverty, the lives of Miro and her father and sister are radically enhanced by the Manaroans-charismatic hippies who use their house as a crash pad on journeys to and from a commune in a remote corner of the Marlborough Sounds. Arriving by power of thumb, horseback and hooped canvas caravan, John of Saratoga, Eddie Fox, Jewels and company set about rearranging the lives and consciousness of the blasted family unit. In the Time of the Manaroans brilliantly captures a largely unwritten historical culture, the Antipodean incarnation of the Back to the Land movement. Contrarian, idealistic, sexually opportunistic and self-mythologising too, this was a movement, as the narrator duly discovers, not conceived with adolescents in mind. At fourteen Miro Bilbrough falls out with the communist grandmother who has raised her since she was seven, and is sent to live with her father and his rural-hippy friends. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781776563128

Bibliographic Details

• Title: In the Time of the Manaroans (Hardcover)
• Publisher: Victoria University of Wellington Press, Wellington
• Publication Date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1776563123
• ISBN 13: 9781776563128
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

A captivating coming-of-age story set amidst New Zealand's counterculture movement.

In 1978, fourteen-year-old Miro is thrust into a world of rural hippies and unconventional living after a fallout with her grandmother. The Floodhouse, a dilapidated dwelling in Canvastown, becomes her new home, shared with her father and sister. Their lives are transformed by the arrival of the Manaroans, charismatic commune members who bring with them a blend of idealism, sexual freedom, and self-mythologizing.

As Miro navigates this unfamiliar landscape, she grapples with family complexities, personal identity, and the challenges of belonging. In the Time of the Manaroans offers a glimpse into a largely unwritten historical culture, exploring themes of rural poverty, social change, and the search for self-discovery. Will Miro find her place in this unconventional world, or will the allure of the modern world beckon her away?

About the Author

Miro Bilbrough is a writer and filmmaker who grew up in New Zealand and lives in Australia. Her poetry chapbook Small-time spectre was published by Kilmog in 2010, and she has a Creative Doctorate of Arts in screenwriting and screen studies from the Writing and Society Research Centre, Western Sydney University. Her critically acclaimed feature films are Being Venice (2012), which premiered at Sydney Film Festival, and Floodhouse (2004). Excerpts and trailers, as well as her six-minute ciné-poem Urn (1995), can be viewed at www.mirobilbrough.com