The Long Road to Parihaka: A Writer's Journey

My proof of Parihaka, which I started in 1996.

I never set out to become a writer. Like most paths that matter, it chose me rather than the other way around.

  It started in high school, of all places. While other schools were teaching the standard curriculum, mine was one of the few that dared to focus on 19th century New Zealand history. Something clicked when I worked on those history projects. I realised I could make the past come alive on the page, that I could weave facts into narratives that meant something. It was a talent I didn’t know I had, and one I didn’t yet know what to do with.

  At Otago University, studying history and law, I made a discovery that would change everything. I learned that my family had a direct connection to the Parihaka prisoners held in Dunedin. It wasn’t just history anymore—it was personal. These weren’t just names in a textbook; they were people whose suffering had echoed down through my own family line.

  It was a strange time to be a student. David Bain was in my history class. Clayton Weatherston was in my finance classes, the Crown Prosecutor of David Bain was my criminal procedure tutor, and the murders of Gene and Eugene Thomas occurred opposite my apartment window. While I studied, I watched nearby the murder trials of Bain, Watson, Barlow, Lundy, and the appeal of Tamihere. It provided me with insight into how truth was only a matter of evidence.

My experiences as a law student and observer of these high-profile trials taught me to critique perspectives and challenge misconceptions. Witnessing the judicial process firsthand—where classmates became defendants, prosecutors became tutors, and murders occurred across the street—forced me to confront the complexity of truth and justice. I learned that legal outcomes often reflect the quality and presentation of evidence rather than absolute truth, that public perception can be swayed by media narratives, and that wrongful convictions are not abstract possibilities but real failures of the system. This education in the gap between what is proven in court and what actually happened has made me perpetually sceptical of simple narratives and careful to distinguish between legal verdicts and historical truth. These lessons shaped my approach to researching Parihaka, where I learned to look beyond official accounts and seek the fuller, more complicated story that emerges when multiple voices and perspectives are heard.

  When I moved to Wellington to complete my studies, I became obsessed about Parihaka. Working as a researcher at the Parliamentary Library, I spent countless hours scouring documents that most people would never see. At the Alexander Turnbull Library, I listened to phonograph recordings of Māori born before the Treaty was signed, trying to understand the different regional and iwi dialects. I needed to hear their voices, not just read their words.

  The more I learned, the clearer it became: so many of New Zealand’s social, economic, and political problems today originate from a few short years in the 1880s. And so much of that period is either seriously misunderstood or deliberately forgotten. Characters like Te Whiti, Tohu, and Thomas Bracken have been stripped of their proper context. Even our national anthem—Bracken’s “God Defend New Zealand”—is so subtle in its cynicism and satire that few understand its true meaning. It was in that satire, that plea for God to defend New Zealand “from dissension, envy, hate, and corruption,” that I heard the truth about what happened at Parihaka.

  That’s when I knew. I wanted to be a writer.

  My father was friends with Alan Duff, who tried to talk me out of it. He knew how brutal the path could be, how many writers give up before they ever break through. I didn’t listen to his advice. Looking back, I’m not sure if that was courage or stubbornness—probably both.

  The truth is, I basically didn’t know what I was doing, nor how to get to where I wanted to go. But I knew what story I needed to tell. With the New Zealand film industry booming during Lord of the Rings, I pitched Parihaka to the New Zealand Film Commission. My tagline was “God Defend New Zealand from itself.” Chris Payne thought it was “inspired,” but he also thought I needed to build my résumé before pitching something so “epic.” Translation: stick to your day job.

  I didn’t.

  During my OE, I watched friends get trapped in London’s rental market, their savings bleeding away month by month. Instead, I used mine differently. I interviewed my grandfather’s war buddies. I even interviewed convicted war criminals. Out of that journey came Sparrow, my first real piece of work.

  I started pitching columns to the New Zealand Herald. To my surprise, one got published. To my absolute astonishment, I received a cheque in the mail as payment. I suddenly had travel money. After a dozen or so cheques, though, the Herald stopped paying for unsolicited columns. It was back to the day job.

  I worked as a town planner for several years, eventually becoming a certified hearings commissioner when that job ended. Those years taught me things I couldn’t have learned any other way. I saw the worst aspects of human nature up close. Local government, I discovered, is far worse—far more petty, unprincipled, and corrupt—than central government politics ever could be. Years later, I came across the most corrupted community in the country, where central and local government collided with vested interests and spiteful politicking. I wrote Unleashed, documenting a history that climaxed with a malicious prosecution in a thwarted attempt to silence me.

  But through it all, my focus was always on building what Sir Ian Mune once described as “clout.”

  I tried my hand at human stories next, exploring the relationship between a horse, a dog, and a troubled teenager through a Freudian lens. I showed the draft of Snow to my agent. A film studio optioned it straight away. Due to recent law changes, I had to register a company to manage the rights and revenue. I named it “Klaut”—the Scottish phonetic pronunciation of “clout.” There was something fitting about that.

  Then COVID hit. The option expired, along with so many other projects caught in that strange suspended time. But the experience taught me something valuable. I realised that all my works, including Snow, should start as books— complete work of literature, with all its depth and nuance—but the structure is there for someone to see how it could translate to screen. Books have permanence. They don’t expire. And if they’re structured right, they’re already halfway to being films.

It’s the best of both worlds—the work stands on its own, and if the right opportunity comes along, the path to adaptation is already clear.

  After Snow, I thought, “What’s next?” I dusted off research from the 1990s, flew to Invercargill, and interviewed Tim Shadbolt. When Pigs Fly became the story of how Mayor Tim inadvertently used his contingency fund for the quarantine of Auckland Island Pigs—pigs that are now invaluable for medical research and treatments.

  Then I revisited the research into my grandfather’s brother’s wartime experiences. He fought from the fall of France, to North Africa, Italy, Normandy, all the way into Germany. The Filthy Fifth became a three-season series on the Fifth Royal Tank Regiment. Originally in the Band of Brothers template, I recently adapted it to fit with the SAS Rogue Heroes format.

Author's proof of The Filthy Fifth, Season 1 (of 3).

  With each project, I learned something new about my craft. I learned that I preferred to focus my energy on observing, researching, and writing rather than being embroiled in politics and positioning.   I had a go at a short film, but others realised its potential as a pilot for a TV series. I've written three seasons and 21 episodes so far.

I learned that good writing requires patience, that stories need time to mature, that sometimes you have to walk away and come back with fresh eyes.

  But every road, no matter how far it wandered, always led back to Parihaka.

The Story That Wouldn’t Let Go

  Parihaka started as a single film pitch decades ago. It has since evolved into something far more ambitious—two interconnected films that tell the story from two different perspectives. It had to be this way. The events at Parihaka were too complex, too layered with competing viewpoints, to be told from just one angle.

  Part One: The Prophet follows Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi as they build a community founded on passive resistance and spiritual strength. After surviving the devastation of the Taranaki Wars, they created something extraordinary at Parihaka—a place where Māori from across the country could gather in peace, where crops grew abundantly, where a new way of living seemed possible. Their non-violent resistance to land confiscation—the ploughmen who returned again and again to till contested land, the fence-builders who refused to acknowledge the boundaries imposed upon them—was revolutionary. When colonial forces finally invaded in 1881, arresting over 1,600 people without charge and systematically destroying the settlement, Te Whiti and Tohu stood firm in their commitment to peace. They spent sixteen months detained without trial, yet never wavered.

  Part Two: The Premier tells the same story through the eyes of Sir George Grey, the former Governor and then Premier of New Zealand. Grey was a man of contradictions—a liberal who genuinely believed in Māori rights, yet a politician who enabled the very system that led to Parihaka’s destruction. He spoke eloquently against the invasion and detention without trial, but his earlier policies and political compromises had set the stage for what John Bryce and others would do. In Parliament, he fought for Te Whiti’s release, recognising the injustice even as his own legacy became entangled with it.

  Both narratives are essential because they reveal something crucial: how good intentions can lead to catastrophic outcomes, how systems of injustice function even when individuals within them recognise the wrong, and how peaceful resistance can triumph morally even in the face of overwhelming force.

  The central characters—Te Whiti, Tohu, Grey, and Thomas Bracken—are vital to understanding not just Parihaka, but New Zealand itself. Bracken, the satirist, poet and MP who witnessed the Parihaka prisoners working in chains on Dunedin Harbour, poured his horror and shame into “God Defend New Zealand.” When people sing those words today, they rarely understand they’re singing a prayer for deliverance from our own worst impulses.

The Logjam

  But here’s where I find myself now: with a logjam.

  Snow is first off the rank. Then there’s When Pigs Fly, The Filthy Fifth, and several other projects, each demanding attention, each with its own timeline and stakeholders.

  And Parihaka sits at the end of that very long queue.

  It’s ironic, really. The story that started this entire journey, the story that made me want to become a writer in the first place, the story that everything else has been building toward—it’s the one that has to wait.

  But perhaps that’s as it should be. If I hadn’t learned and honed my skills through all those other projects, Parihaka wouldn’t be what it is today. Each story I’ve told has taught me something I needed to know to tell this one properly. Sparrow taught me research and the weight of testimony. Snow taught me how animals and nature can reveal human truth. Unleashed taught me about corruption and courage. The Filthy Fifth taught me how to handle multiple perspectives and complex timelines.

  Parihaka has been waiting for over 140 years. It can wait a little longer until I’m truly ready to do it justice.

  The company is called Klaut for a reason. Clout isn’t just about having influence—it’s about having earned the right to tell certain stories. Every project I complete, every skill I master, every mistake I learn from, adds to that clout. When Parihaka finally moves forward, it will be because I’ve built the credibility, the craft, and the platform necessary to tell it the way it deserves to be told.

  So I keep writing. I keep researching. I keep building.

  Because some stories are worth a lifetime of preparation.