Story time with Mere Whaanga at Wairoa Public Library

YOUNG visitors to the Wairoa Public Library were treated with a story time session by one of the town’s most well-known children’s books authors. Māhia-based author Mere Whaanga is well known for her books The Legend of the Seven Whales and Tangaroa’s Gift and more recently wrote The Singing Dolphin inspired by Moko the bottlenose dolphin that used to entertain swimmers at Māhia, Gisborne and Whakatāne between 2007 and 2010. The story time session was on of the finale events of the libraries winter school holiday programme of activities and is the second story time they have had this year. Creating a story about the how the pāua got its colours was inspired by walking her children along Onenui Beach at Māhia “I used to spend a lot of time collecting shells at Onenui and studying the colours as an artist wanting to paint them.”