• Site for NZ readers spotlights local books in digital formats: KETE Books

    News release July 2, 2024 Kete Books, the website dedicated to helping readers discover New Zealand books and authors, has been rebuilt and is now live, connecting New Zealanders to their local books in all formats at an enhanced level. Created by The Coalition for Books, ketebooks.co.nz is the place to discover reading ideas and inspiration, find […]

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  • Record-breaking attendance signals a new era for Auckland Writers Festival Waituhi o Tāmaki

    May 20, 2024   The Auckland Writers Festival Waituhi o Tāmaki has broken all attendance records, ushering in a bold and exciting new era for the Southern Hemisphere’s largest literary festival. Held at Auckland’s Aotea Centre from 14 – 19 May, attendance reached a record high of more than 85,000. The programme was designed to […]

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  • Ockham New Zealand Book Awards 2024 Winners

    ‘Disturbing, smart, and funny as hell’ novel wins country’s richest writing prize. Internationally acclaimed New Zealand writer Emily Perkins MNZM has won the $65,000 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the 2024 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards for Lioness – a smart, multi-layered, laugh-out-loud novel exploring wealth, class and female mid-life reckoning.   Ms […]

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  • Anne Kennedy to judge $1000 Poetry Prize – Kathleen Grattan IWW Sequence 2024

    International Writers’ Workshop NZ Inc 12 April 2024 Anne Kennedy is the judge of The Kathleen Grattan Prize for a Sequence of Poems 2024 with a first prize of $1000 for the winner. Anne is a Tāmaki Makaurau poet, novelist and teacher. Awards include the Prime Minister’s Award for Poetry, the NZ Post Book Award […]

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  • Ōrongohau | Best New Zealand Poems 2023 captures the spirit of the times

      The latest edition of the online anthology Ōrongohau | Best New Zealand Poems is now live, featuring 25 poems chosen by Poet Laureate Chris Tse from nearly 4000 published in 2023. “These are the poems that surprised and delighted me the most, that made me pause to sit in my own discomfort or revel […]

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  • Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day August 23

    The date for this year’s Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day is Friday 23 August. Event registrations and seed funding applications are now OPEN. Head over to www.poetryday.co.nz for registration forms, resources and more. Let’s come together to make poetry shine! #NZPoetryDay.

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  • Literary heavyweights vie for top fiction prize in Ockham NZ Book Awards

    WEDNESDAY 6 MARCH 2024  Booker Prize-winning author Eleanor Catton faces off against critically acclaimed former national award winners Emily Perkins, Pip Adam and Stephen Daisley for the $65,000 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction, as finalists in the 2024 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards announced today. The four novelists are joined by a further 12 […]

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  • 2023 Prime Minister Award recipients: Linda Tuhiwai Smith (non-fiction), Lee Murray (fiction), and Tusiata Avia (poetry).

    A writer of speculative fiction, a scholar of indigenous studies, and a poet, performer and children’s book author are the recipients of the 2023 Prime Minister’s Awards for Literary Achievement. All three have had international recognition and awards, as well as being celebrated at home. This year’s recipients are: Fiction: Lee Murray – an award-winning […]

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  • The 2023 winner of IWW The Kathleen Grattan Prize for a Sequence of Poems is Caroline Masters

    International Writers’ Workshop NZ Inc    27 November 2023 International Writers’ Workshop NZ is delighted to announce that Caroline Masters from Tāmaki Makarau / Auckland is the 2023 winner of The Kathleen Grattan Prize for a Sequence of Poems, and Sarah Scott from Te Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington, is runner-up. The competition was judged by Emma […]

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  • Jo McNeice awarded Kathleen Grattan Poetry Award

      Wellington-based poet Jo McNeice has been awarded this year’s Kathleen Grattan Poetry Award for her manuscript, Blue Hour. She receives a $10,000 prize and a year’s subscription to Landfall. Otago University Press will also publish her winning manuscript in 2024. Composed over the past 25 years, McNeice says that a significant amount of Blue […]

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  • Keri Hulme’s legacy honoured in new award for Māori writers at the 2023 Pikihuia Awards

    28 October 2023 Poet essa may ranapiri took out the Keri Hulme Award at the Pikihuia Awards held in Wellington last night. This was the first time the award has been offered. It results from Keri Hulme’s wish to support Maori writers by setting up a fund from the sale of the original manuscript of […]

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  • POETS ON THE WRITERS WALK competition results

    At a salon for Poetry Day at City Gallery Wellington on Friday 25 August, competition judge Janis Freegard announced the winners of the POETS ON THE WRITERS WALK competition run by Wellington Writers Walk and the Wellington Branch of New Zealand Society of Authors for Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day 2023. You can find full […]

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