Wild Pork and Watercress
  • Published: 1 August 2023
  • ISBN: 9781776950720
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 208
  • RRP: $15.99

Wild Pork and Watercress

Formats & editions
Paperback
1 Aug 2023
Tr. Paperback
29 Feb 2016
EBook
29 Feb 2016
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This classic has been released in the Popular Penguin format to mark 50 years of publishing in New Zealand. The format reaches further back to 1935, when Allen Lane founded Penguin Books with a clear vision: ‘We believed in the existence of a vast reading public for intelligent books at a low price, and staked everything on it.’


When Social Welfare threatens to put Ricky into care, the overweight Māori boy and cantankerous Uncle Hec flee into the remote Ureweras. The impassable bush serves up perilous adventures, hunger and wild pigs. Worse still are the authorities, determined to bring the pair to justice. But life on the run also delivers a bond of trust and love. The novel was developed into the box-office hit Hunt for the Wilderpeople.
  • Published: 1 August 2023
  • ISBN: 9781776950720
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 208
  • RRP: $15.99
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About the author

Barry Crump

The laconic Barry Crump, who died in 1996, began writing humorous sketches of life as a government deer-culler and pig hunter, publishing these as A Good Keen Man in 1960. By 1992 his New Zealand book sales were estimated at more than a million copies. As well as a bestselling author, Crump was an actor, television personality, poet, radio commentator, traveller, goldminer, photographer and more. Crump wrote 24 books in his lifetime, was married five times and had six children, all sons.

Praise for Wild Pork and Watercress

Wild Pork and Watercress was a novel that I couldn't put down. It was hilarious and being married to a hunter-gatherer, I could relate to nearly everything in the book. . . . I still preferred the book, and would encourage anyone who is interested in seeing the movie to read it first. It definitely will not disappoint.

Waiuku & Districts Post

With the addition of behind-the-scenes photos from the making of The Hunt for the Wilderpeople, this edition provides a great chance to hook the younger members of the family on reading, especially once they’ve seen and loved the film. It’s a memento they can use. And for those of us a wee bit older, the updated preface from Crump’s son Martin is an interesting read. What we know about Barry Crump today is a lot different to what we knew about him when he first started publishing; regardless of his shortcomings in other personal areas, his tales of the bush and the men he encountered there are part of NZ’s literary history, and Wild Pork and Watercress is a must have in every New Zealander’s library.

Sarah McMullan, Booksellers News

Wild Pork and Watercress is a humorous tale that discloses a universal truth: When challenged, we discover who we truly are to ourselves as well as to others. But it is not just a novel about outsiders, or even New Zealand as a nation of outsiders, but it is dedicated to a wondrous place where adventures are bound to happen.

Hanna Komornitzyk, Berlin's NPR News Station

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Wild Pork and Watercress