GOLDEN DAYS  is the story of the intense late-teen 1995 friendship between bookish Becky and star-dusted Zoe Golden—music, clubs, art collaboration, spirituality, sex—and what happens when one terrifying night changes their lives and destroys their friendship forever.

We meet first-person protagonist Becky again seventeen years later, drunk for days and mourning the end of her picture-perfect marriage. When Zoe reappears, Becky is forced—with the help of her oldest friend, Meg—to reconsider her interpretation of that summer’s tragic events, where blame lies and her true nature.

“Set to a playlist of Massive Attack, The Cranberries, Gwen Stefani and Stone Temple Pilots, and iconic 90s soundtracks such as Basketball Diaries and Natural Born Killers, GOLDEN DAYS travels Auckland’s city streets and clubs, and the black sand of rugged Piha beach. GOLDEN DAYS is a timely novel of great psychological depth by an award-winning memoirist.”

— Affirm Press, Australia, 28 February 2023

Praise

Nostalgic and tender as a bruise.

— Jacqueline Bublitz, author of Before You Knew My Name

Golden Days mixes sharp dialogue with delicate and deceptive reflection.

— The Age/The Sydney Morning Herald

…there’s an evocative sense of time and place, eerie imagery, nail-chewing tension, clever characterisation and the acutely observed acceleration of Becky’s trajectory towards danger.

— Kete

It’s a riveting read that also acts as a nostalgic ode to growing up in Auckland in the ’90s.

— Woman’s Day

Bookclub notes

Go to Becky’s playlist

Listen to a Spotify playlist of the songs that Becky and Zoe were listening to in Auckland in the 1990s. Enjoy!

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