If anyone can be called a ‘Christchurch writer’, it’s Carl Nixon. He’s never felt the need to look elsewhere than Ōtautahi and the South Island for either setting or characters. He talks to Cityscape about his new novel, The Waters, which traces 40 years in the life of a Christchurch family.

You do like the adage ‘Write what you know’, don’t you? I think writing what you know allows me to get all the details right, which makes the writing feel authentic. Also in order to sustain a long-term writing project you need to feel passionate about it. Writing about places and people that you're familiar with is, for me anyway, more motivating than a completely imagined world. Having said that, my third novel, The Virgin and the Whale, was a historical story set in 1920, which involved a lot of research.

How long has this story been bubbling away? What was its inspiration? The Waters is an unusual hybrid; a novel where each chapter is a short story. I’ve been writing short stories since the beginning of my career and had a collection published in 2006 called Fish ‘n’ Chip Shop Song and Other Stories. I've been writing short stories on and off between novels and plays since then but what I discovered was that those stories tended to be about the same people – a family living down Brighton in Christchurch. There was a father, a mother, two boys and the younger sister. I was particularly interested in the eldest son, Mark. The earliest story in what became The Waters probably dates from about 2007.

What do you hope readers will take from it? I hope that readers will encounter a family who, although fictitious, struggle with many of the same issues real families in New Zealand are dealing with. The collection takes place over 40 years, starting in 1978 and finishing just before the COVID pandemic. In a way it's a slice of New Zealand history filtered through a small group of individuals, each of whom has their own issues to deal with.

Any chance we might see it as a stage adaptation one day? Although I do sometimes adapt my fiction for the stage, I don't think the broad scope of The Waters lends itself very well to theatre. Although I should never say never. Who knows what might happen.

Landscape is often a character in your writing rather than just a backdrop. Any thoughts on that? I do have a love of the New Zealand landscape, particularly the South Island and especially New Brighton and the Port Hills. In The Waters, my characters do spend a lot of time in New Brighton, which is where the kids are raised and where their father has a housing development he's working on in the late 1970s.

Do you feel there is a consistent theme in your work? It's hard for a writer to identify their own themes. Broadly speaking, I suppose I'm interested in families and particularly the culture of individual families that feeds through into the personalities and fates of the children. And then the adults they grow up to be.

Looking back on growing up in Christchurch and the South Island, can you see influences in your writing? One of my earliest influences was Owen Marshall who's short stories particularly are rooted in the landscape of the South Island and sometimes Christchurch. It certainly never occurred to me that my own writing needed to look elsewhere for either setting or character.

What excites you about Christchurch in the winter? I'm a big fan of the change of seasons. Although I enjoy summer, I love the brisk days of winter and dressing up in jerseys and jackets. I also play masters’ football, so winter is the football season. I love the weekly trainings and the Saturday games. These days I play in the over 50s division so as you can imagine the quality of the football has diminished over the years. The camaraderie and enjoyment of the game though has only become stronger.

Any advice for those thinking of a writing career? A writing career in New Zealand is probably never going to be lucrative simply because of the small size of the market. It probably pays to first marry someone extremely rich or win Lotto. Or win the Booker Prize with your first or second novel – that would definitely help.

Prolific writer, father, husband – how do you make that all work? All I really do is write. It's my job and also my obsession. I've been doing it for a long time. I've been very lucky to have several strings to my bow – fiction, which has been published widely overseas (in the US, Europe and also in Asia). I also write for theatre and work on screenplays. I have the strong support of my partner, which is crucial, both economically and emotionally.

What’s your go-to spot in Christchurch? I'm loving the Riverside market at the moment and in more general terms the redevelopment of the central city. Although it's only going to get better, there's a real vibrancy to the inner city.

What’s your favourite way to spend a Sunday afternoon? Because I play football on a Saturday, Sundays are spent recovering. I can often be found on the couch watching replays of the Premier League games on Sky I'm wondering why I can't play like. If the weather is good, my wife and I often go out for a long walk in the afternoon but nothing too strenuous.

What’s your next project? I'm currently working through the third draft of a new novel. It's a literary thriller set between New Zealand and London; working title, Nikki D. It's my first novel written in the first person and I'm very much enjoying the process.

The Waters, by Carl Nixon (Penguin Random House). Available from 1 August.

carlnixon.co.nz