Fiction for Survival: Storytelling in the Face of Ecological Crisis

How do you weave the impact of climate change into fiction without losing your reader to despair? What does it mean to write stories that reflect our changing world while still holding space for hope, resilience, and action? In this timely conversation, authors Clare Moleta, Mikaela Nyman, and Tim Jones join facilitator Cassie Hart (Kāi Tahu / Kāti Māmoe) to explore the responsibilities of writing climate change fiction. Together, they’ll discuss how storytelling can confront ecological crisis while offering readers space to think, feel, and imagine collective futures grounded in care, courage, and urgency.

Speaker bio

Mikaela Nyman is from the autonomous, demilitarised Åland Islands in Finland and lives in Taranaki. Her critically acclaimed climate fiction novel SADO was published by Te Herenga Waka University Press in 2020. Her two poetry collections in Swedish were nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize in 2020 and 2024 respectively. Her first poetry collection in English, The Anatomy of Sand (THWUP, 2025), connects Taranaki and Finland and asks us to pay attention to how our present-day actions will impact future ecological events. In 2024, she was the Robert Burns Fellow.

Clare Moleta was born in Aotearoa and raised on Whadjuk Noongar Country in Western Australia. She has lived in Pōneke/Wellington since 2005. Her first novel, (Scribner 2021) follows a mother’s search for her lost daughter across a climate-ravaged continent. It was longlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction and the Margaret and Colin Roderick Literary Award. In 2024 it was included in The Conversation’s ‘20 best New Zealand books of the 21st century’.

Tim Jones lives in Te Whanganui-a-Tara/ Wellington. He was awarded the NZSA Peter & Dianne Beatson Fellowship in 2022. His recent books include climate fiction novel Emergency Weather (The Cuba Press, 2023). His new poetry collection Dracula in the Colonies will be published by The Cuba Press in 2025.

ABOUT THE STORY WORLDS FESTIVAL

Story Worlds is a new festival that invites audiences to experience storytelling as a rich, interconnected practice—through the written word, material culture, and oral traditions. Explore the programme, which stretches across Puke Ariki Museum, Libraries, and the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery | Len Lye Centre for four days of sessions that celebrate storytelling in all its forms and honour the ways stories help us make sense of ourselves, each other, and the world we share.

At Puke Ariki accessibility is very important to us. We want everyone in the community to be able to enjoy our museum and libraries. A lift goes from the St Aubyn Street car park to the museum entrance. There are three lifts inside Puke Ariki that will get you to all parts of the building.

This event will be held in the Puke Ariki Library Community Lounge.

Photo credit Ebony Lamb photography

Also check out other Arts events in New Plymouth, Literary Art events in New Plymouth.