Strays and Waifs

by Mandy Hager

Cli-fi writer and climate activist Bella Goodfellow wants to save the world, but how can she do that when she can’t even save herself?
Forced from her hideaway after a landslide swallows it whole, she finds temporary accommodation with her publisher’s elderly aunt on the Kāpiti Coast. But lilac-eyed Freyja is not what she seems, and soon Bella’s flung into a crazy scheme to expose a murderer and rescue a child. There’s just one problem – before they can act Bella must believe what Freyja is telling her … and reopen her heart to her painful past.
An Aotearoa crime thriller by a master storyteller.

288 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2024

About the author

Mandy Hager is a multi-award winning writer of fiction, most often for young adults. She has won the LIANZA Book Awards for Young Adult fiction 3 times (‘Smashed’ 2008, ‘The Nature of Ash’ 2013, ‘Dear Vincent’ 2014), the NZ Post Children’s Book Awards for YA fiction (‘The Crossing’ 2010), an Honour Award in the 1996 AIM Children’s Book Awards (‘Tom’s Story’), Golden Wings Excellence Award (‘Juno Lucina,’ 2002), Golden Wings Award (‘Run For The Trees’, 2003) and Five Notable Book Awards.
She has also been awarded the 2012 Beatson Fellowship, the 2014 Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellowship and the 2015 Waikato University Writer in Residence.
In 2015 her novel ‘Singing Home the Whale’ was awarded the Margaret Mahy Book of the Year award, and the Best Young Adult fiction Award from the NZ Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. It has also been named a 2016 IBBY Honour Book, an international award. Her historical novel for adults, titled ‘Heloise’, was long-listed for the Ockham Book Awards.
She is a trained teacher, with an Advanced Diploma in Fine Arts (Whitireia) and an MA in Creative Writing for Victoria University. She also writes adult fiction, short stories, non-fiction, educational resources, blogs and articles, and currently tutors the Novel Course for Whitireia’s Creative Writing Programme.

Reviews

[Philippa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This pacy mystery is woven around the unlikely friendship between an unexpectedly homeless young climate activist, and an older psychic who's losing her eyesight. Together, they unravel the secrets around a woman's death, put themselves in harm's way to rescue a child, and along the way help each other to face up to the ghosts of their pasts.
Mandy Hager mainly writes young adult fiction and, while this has a slightly older (30ish?) protagonist in Bella, she still exudes quite a young energy, and I can imagine teens enjoying this.
The plot is solid, if somewhat predictable, although the supernatural scattered here and there adds spice, and there's warmth and verve in the writing.

[Laurence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great storytelling and a real page turner. I loved the main characters, and they are so well painted that I can see them clearly. Weaving the spiritual world and climate change activism while standing firmly in the world of rational thinking (ie no conspiracies) is a difficult job, and is done with skill and expertise. 4+ stars

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I reviewed Strays & Waifs on my blog:

https://www.timjonesbooks.co.nz/2025/...