Rosetta Allan

Rosetta Allan is an Auckland-based poet and novelist who grew up in Napier, a seaport city in Hawke’s Bay and the inspiration for many of the characters and landscapes in her writing. Her bestselling debut novel, Purgatory, was selected as an Apple iBook Top 10 Best Reads of 2014. In 2016, Allan was the first New Zealander to be appointed writer-in-residence at St. Petersburg Art Residency, Russia. She is currently the Creative NZ/University of Waikato Writer in Residence.

Website: rosettaallan.com
Twitter: @RosettaAllan
Instagram: @rosetta.allan

FESTIVAL BOOK

The Unreliable People

The Unreliable People is a compelling story where love and loss intersect unexpectedly with a Korean fable about a crow king and a rice farmer’s wife.

Antonina is a student at the prestigious Academy of Art in St. Petersburg. She knows she stands out as different, being neither Russian, Korean, nor Kazakh – and yet she embodies all three. She is Koryo-saram: a descendant of the exiled population that Stalin labelled the Unreliable People. But what does that mean? And who was the strange, elegant woman who came to the window when Antonina was a young child? And why did she entice Antonina to climb out and go on a long train journey through Kazakhstan?