NZ Book Awards offer fiction prize of $50,000

The revamped New Zealand Book Awards, now sponsored by the Ockham property group, will be contested by 40 titles published in the past year.

The “long list” in the fiction category is headed by novels from established names such as Greg McGee, Patrick Evans and Patricia Grace.

The illustrated non-fiction section includes, of course, a cooking book but also ranges through geology, biology, music history and tramping.

Tramping also features in the general non-fiction category along with books about two writers, houses, kitchens and Māori slavery. The contribution of business to New Zealand life again failed to make the grade.

Some 240 entries were received and the shortlist will be announced on March 8, 2016.

The winners (including the four Best First Book Awards and a Māori Language award) will be announced at the opening night event of the Auckland Writers Festival on 10 May 10, 2016.

NZ Book Awards Trust chairwoman Nicola Legat says the decision to announce a long list followed consultation with the wider literary community.

“A long list more equitably showcases a wider number of books in a strong publishing environment where there is very close competition," she says.

"It is a demonstration of how vital New Zealand literature is and how talented our writers are.”

She says interest will be high in the fiction prize as the winner will receive the Acorn Foundation Literary Award worth $50,000.

The judges are: Fiction – Owen Marshall, Tilly Lloyd and Jill Rawnsley;  Illustrated non-fiction – Jane Connor, Linda Tyler and Leonie Hayden; General non-fiction – Simon Wilson, Lydia Wevers and Dr Jarrod Gilbert; Poetry – Elizabeth Caffin, Paul Millar and Selina Tusitala Marsh.

The longlisted titles are:

Fiction:

• The Antipodeans by Greg McGee (Upstart Press)

• Astonished Dice: Collected Short Stories by Geoff Cochrane (Victoria University Press)

• The Back of His Head by Patrick Evans (Victoria University Press)

• Chappy by Patricia Grace (Penguin Random House)

• The Chimes by Anna Smaill (Hodder & Stoughton)

• Coming Rain by Stephen Daisley (Text Publishing)

• The Invisible Mile by David Coventry (Victoria University Press)

• The Legend of Winstone Blackhat by Tanya Moir (Penguin Random House)

• The Pale North by Hamish Clayton (Penguin Random House)

• Reach by Laurence Fearnley (Penguin Random House)

Illustrated non-fiction:

• Zealandia: Our Continent Revealed by Nick Mortimer and Hamish Campbell (Penguin Random House)

• My Family Table: Simple Wholefood Recipes from Petite Kitchen by Eleanor Ozich (Allen & Unwin)

• Hello Girls and Boys! A New Zealand Toy Story by David Veart (Auckland University Press)

• Tuatara: Biology and Conservation of a Venerable Survivor by Alison Cree (Canterbury University Press)

• Real Modern: Everyday New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s by Bronwyn Labrum (Te Papa Press)

• Coast. Country.Neighbourhood.City edited by Michael Barrett (Six Point Press)

• Te Ara Puoro: A Journey into the World of Māori Music by Richard Nunns (Potton and Burton)

• New Zealand Photography collected by Athol McCredie (Te Papa Press)

• Tangata Whenua: An Illustrated History by Atholl Anderson, Judith Binney, Aroha Harris (Bridget Williams Books)

• Tramping: a New Zealand History by Shaun Barnett and Chris MacLean (Potton and Burton)

General non-fiction:

• Maurice Gee: Life and Work by Rachel Barrowman (Victoria University Press)

• Terrain: Travels Through a Deep Landscape by Geoff Chapple (Penguin Random House)

• The Villa at the Edge of the Empire: One Hundred Ways to Read a City by Fiona Farrell (Penguin Random House)

• Māori Boy: A Memoir of Childhood by Witi Ihimaera (Penguin Random House)

• Lost and Gone Away by Lynn Jenner (Auckland University Press)

• Kitchens: The New Zealand Kitchen in the 20th Century by Helen Leach (Otago University Press)

• Panguru and the City, Kāinga Tahi, Kāinga Rua: An Urban Migration History by Melissa Matutina Williams (Bridget Williams Books)

• Outcasts of the Gods? The Struggle over Slavery in Māori New Zealand by Hazel Petrie (Auckland University Press)

• Journey to a Hanging by Peter Wells (Penguin Random House)

• The Healthy Country? A History of Life and Death in New Zealand by Alistair Woodward and Tony Blakley (Auckland University Press)

Poetry:

• The Art of Excavation by Leilani Tamu (Anahera Press)

• Shaggy Magpie Songs by Murray Edmond (Auckland University Press)

• How to be Dead in a Year of Snakes by Chris Tse (Auckland University Press)

• The Night We Ate the Baby by Tim Upperton (Haunui Press)

• Otherwise by John Dennison (Auckland University Press)

• Mr Clean & The Junkie by Jennifer Compton (Mākaro Press)

• Song of the Ghost in the Machine by Roger Horrocks (Victoria University Press)

• Tender Machines by Emma Neale (Otago University Press)

• The Conch Trumpet by David Eggleton (Otago University Press)

• Dear Neil Roberts by Airini Beautrais (Victoria University Press)

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