Brannavan Gnanalingam

@brannavan.bsky.social

902 Followers 606 Following

Novelist and occasional reviewer

Sam Neill in Possession
Manuscript of my new novel, U.X.O.
We’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas
Say the line I also have a job hawking an AI product
Public opening of Te Kahu, the campus connecting Te Rua (National Archives) and Te Puna (the National Library)
Writing within a hair’s breadth of the “real” current political moment in Aotearoa/”New Zealand,” Gnanalingam gives uncensored voice to Kartik Popat—wet-dream of the political white right—a member of the model minority who hates other immigrants. Popat half-arses up to levels of power that offer him opportunities for fame and grift giving fictional life to the new New Zealand politician—selfish, ignorant and incredibly dangerous. In Gnanalingam’s hands this novel is heartbreaking and hilarious, a call to action and a reassurance in an age of misinformation that what we are seeing is what we are seeing.
Crowd at Poetry Reading Really Digging the Short Ones
A still from Peter Watkins’ Edvard Munch
Under the first Labour government New Zealand took an independent line in the League of Nations. For instance, when Italy invaded Ethiopia in 1935 the league imposed economic sanctions against Italy, but these were lifted in 1936 when Italy threatened to go to war over the matter. New Zealand opposed the lifting of sanctions and the league's decision not to challenge Italian aggression, which put New Zealand at odds with Britain's position. The government justified its stance by saying New Zealand was a sovereign country and did not always have to support Britain - Te Ara
Statue of “Turkmenbashi the Great”
Is your life getting in the way of your writing? This masterclass will run through how to balance planning, research, drafting, and editing around your day-to-day life. Brannavan Gnanalingam, the author of eight novels, and full-time lawyer will share practical tips on how to balance everything.
Writers share a love letter to the music that moves them. Join 2025 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction winner and member of the band the Close Readers Damien Wilkins, Brannavan Gnanalingam, Pohlen Newbery (Ngai Tūhoe, Ngāti Manunui), and Claudia Jardine as they each share a band or musician that has had an indelible impact on their lives. Be introduced to new musical gems or gain fresh perspectives on old favourites. Hosted by Kiran Dass. With support from Main Divide
Who would you invite to your ultimate dream dinner party? Whether it’s pop culture legends, historical figures, fictional characters, or friends and family, the possibilities are endless! Food lovers Nici Wickes, Brannavan Gnanalingam and Jessica Hutchings (Ngāi Tahu, Ngāti Huirapa, Gujarati) join Alex Casey to set the scene by imagining their dream guest list, and tell us what food and drink would be on their dream menu. A joyful celebration of kai.
With his novel The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat, writer and lawyer Brannavan Gnanalingam has created a sharp satire of Wellington’s political scene and who’s actually pulling the strings. He joins Nic Low (Ngāi Tahu) for a wide-reaching conversation about political power, the changing nature of a city, thwarted artists, identity politics and democratic principles.
To Her Door - Paul Kelly Mr Somewhere - The Apartments The World’s a Girl - Anita Lane Wide Open Road - The Triffids Cattle and Cane - The Go-Betweens Since I Left You - The Avalanches I Touch Myself - Divinyls Under the Milky Way - The Church Fruits of Labour - Party Dozen Can’t Get You out of My Head - Kylie
La Maman et la Putain by Jean Eustache
Victoria Ratliff, White Lotus
I now had to diversify my output and shift away from Covid, applying a certain amnesia that also harnessed the angst. I started with easy targets, and I’d say things like how immigrants came over here and worked hard and didn’t blame colonisation in their home countries to get on with things here, and how we didn’t need to focus on grievance politics anymore, and how it was unfair that so much spending was going towards Māori, or I’d double-down on attacks on the trans community, because I’d come to realise that there was a whole zombie horde out in the UK, a privileged generation of middle-class white women, desperate for victim status in spite of their economic power built on the back of the work done by the second-wavers, were blaming trans people allegedly lurking everywhere to ensure that they could continue to claim that they were just as much victims as other minorities, or otherwise I’d amplify accounts of white men who were being mocked or teased or losing their jobs and careers thanks to leftists (though the latter didn’t really happen, we just needed people to think that it could happen, and we’d underplay the criminal convictions of those who were actually fired), as I had come to realise that people were desperate to be seen as the unfairly treated ones
Gnanalingam lifts us from the stratospheric frivolity of Kartik’s early ambitions and lands us smoothly onto the concrete tarmac of 2020 where we witness his disintegration through a series of events which are perhaps still painful for the collective Kiwi psyche to relive. The isolation. The breakdown of law and order. The fraying of bonds. The shattering of trust. And finally, the encounter with truth. It is brave for the author to choose a main character who is emphatically not ‘model minority’ material, who is spurned by his own South Asian community, who is The Other’s Other, and to use him to hold up a mirror to Aotearoa New Zealand society. Perhaps there’s an archetypal function to this persona. Perhaps Gnanalingam knows that it is only by presenting the truth through this hyena, that we might be able to face our own most secret appetites.
I did consider voting Green… and in hindsight, I probably should have, because it would have assisted my narrative going forward - “former disillusioned Green voter” sounded better, I must admit, than the sensible Khandallah Kaiser and pugilistic Perky-nana, and yes, I told Joe that I voted Green, and yes, I’ve since told people that I voted Green in 2005 because I’d gone too far with my lie.”
Gnanalingam’s instantly iconic and deceptively clever thought-experiment The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat, connects endstate far-right disinfo Disgrasians with our classic Asian diaspora starting point of ‘what if I was a loser with no friends?’
I wasn’t convinced my Indian nationalist income stream was sturdy, and I’d neglected some of their messaging with my pill work, because I was making legitimate money, so I hadn’t noticed that a couple had stopped paying, and their “please explain” emails had slipped to my spam folders, and one hadn’t taken too kindly to the fact I accidentally promoted the Farmers’ Protests (look, I didn’t know what they were about).
Kash Patel tank tops
Excerpt from Kartik Popat
Ramaswamy is already being cut by Musk and having a tilt at the Ohio governorship
Gnanalingam pulls us under the skin of a character that is at once loathsome, hilarious and wholly realised. It’s a book for this age: a timely, incendiary, and chilling glimpse into representational politics, echo chambers and how the algorithm machine has forever changed modern democracy
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has agreed to give Winston Peters a new role and will give him ministerial responsibility for rail
Hīkoi forming at Waitangi Park
Lisa Simpson “Grade me! Look at me! Evaluate and rank me! Oh! I’m good, good, and oh, so smart!”
Front cover of The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat
Gena Rowlands in Faces
Waterworks building
Grimmish by Michael Winkler, Since the Accident by Jen Craig, and Carpentaria by Alexis Wright