I think one of the interesting side effects of being in New Zealand during Covid-19 is that people are looking closer to home for everything – at least in Aotearoa, where we're in a small Covid-free bubble of our own. So here's another homegrown scientist!
Dr. Ngaio Beausoleil also works at Massey University, but unlike me at the artsy Wellington campus, she's on the agri nexus of New Zealand, Palmerston North. I found out about her work while researching for my suspended Herdr project, and have continued to be in awe of her research output quality and volume.
A ngaio is a lovely kind of tree endemic to Aotearoa. It looks like this:
She shares the same given name as Ngaio Marsh, New Zealand's Agatha Christie.
I've been living in Aotearoa New Zealand for about two and half years now. It's an amazing place. I've been learning about the country, the people, and its history. It's a complex place, filled with contradictions. Much like the US, it was colonized by the British, its indigenous peoples subjugated and their rich cultural and mythological heritage abused. It started to come into its own around the 1920s, after a huge percentage of their population decimated in World War I. In short, what I'm saying is that Aotearoa is ripe as a setting for Call of Cthulhu games.
My rudimentary search of the webs hasn't turned up any existing settings for CoC in New Zealand, which of course isn't conclusive. There is the Terror Australis: Cthulhu Down Under guidebook, but Australia is a very different place than Aotearoa (the similarities in accent and flag notwithstanding). But here's a quick pitch list for the setting:
Edge-of-the-world environment
Only accessible by long sea voyage in pre-1950s
1920s through present day
Complex and deep indigenous mythologies and beliefs
Taniwha and Whiro, rivers and forests with personhood
Colonial presence, carrying ancient evils into a new land
Politics dominated by a treaty, with possible eldritch overtones
Last stop on the way to Antartica and R'lyeh
Crazy goldmines, dark fjords, and insane geological formations
So I guess the question is: should I write the damn guidebook?
