The 16 books still in the running, with commentary from Claire Mabey.
The judges have sliced away more than half of the 44 longlisted books to arrive at a tidy packet of 16. As ever our predictions have been both affirmed and shattered into a thousand grains of ink and paper. There are 11 publishers represented (meaning good things for breadth of bookmaking in Aotearoa) and a swath of previous Ockham winners, as well as newly published talents…
Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction ($65,000 prize)
A Better Place by Stephen Daisley (Text Publishing)
Audition by Pip Adam (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury Publishing)
Thoughts: There were always going to be several ways to skin this cat. There were at least six worthy winners in the longlist and I feel bad for Anna Smaill’s Bird Life and Chidgey’s Pet, both of which I predicted would make it through and both of which I think would have been here had the competition been slightly less extraordinary.
All four writers on this shortlist are previous winners of this very prize (or version of it). Convener of judges Juliet Blyth says, “These four singular and accomplished titles encompass pertinent themes of social justice, violence, activism, capitalism, war, identity, class, and more besides. Variously confronting, hilarious, philosophical, and heart-rending, these impressive works showcase Aotearoa storytellers at the top of their game.”
I’m still picking Pip Adam’s Audition for the big win but who the hell knows with this fancy quartet. I loved Birnam Wood with its grandiose plot, its critique of the earnest left, its bashing of the greedy, psychotic billionaires who get away with literal murder every day. And who could not love Emily Perkins’ Lioness? The skewering of wellness bullshit, the elevation of the middle-aged woman and her magic and her power. Disclaimer: I’m yet to read Daisley’s novel but am firmly convinced now that I must and will do and will report back.
Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry ($12,000 prize)
At the Point of Seeing by Megan Kitching (Otago University Press)*
Chinese Fish by Grace Yee (Giramondo Publishing)*
Root Leaf Flower Fruit by Bill Nelson (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
Talia by Isla Huia (Te Āti Haunui a-Pāpārangi, Uenuku) (Dead Bird Books)*
Thoughts: I was halfway there with the predictions. Since the Ockhams longlist was announced, Grace Yee has won both the $100,000 Victorian prize for literature and the $25,000 poetry category at this year’s Victorian premier’s literary awards in Australia (where Yee lives). It’s the first time in a decade that poetry has won the premiere award and surely a certainty that, if Yee wins the poetry category at the Ockhams here in Aotearoa, the first time anyone has ever scooped both awards in what would be a poetic piece of trans-Tasman symmetry. You can read an interview between Yee and Emma Sidnam (who was longlisted for the fiction prize) on The Spinoff here.
Erik Kennedy, convenor of judges for this category says: “These volumes blur genres and disrupt preconceptions of poetic form, they re-vision landscapes and histories, and they deploy languages other than English in distinct ways that encourage multiplicity.”
At the Point of Seeing by Megan Kitching, and Talia by Isla Huia are both debut collections making this their first time at the Ockhams in general – what a way to begin. Kitching’s book revels in the everyday moments of communion with nature; while Isla Huia’s poetry speaks to the vast and potent connections of whakapapa Māori. For me, the book that will challenge Yee’s spot at the top is Bill Nelson’s Root Leaf Flower Fruit: so beautifully ambitious as a verse novel, and not one word out of place. Read an interview with Bill Nelson on The Spinoff here.
Booksellers Aotearoa New Zealand Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction ($12,000 prize)
Don Binney: Flight Path by Gregory O’Brien (Auckland University Press)
Fungi of Aotearoa: A Curious Forager’s Field Guide by Liv Sisson (Penguin, Penguin Random House)*
Marilynn Webb: Folded in the Hills by Lauren Gutsell, Lucy Hammonds and Bridget Reweti (Dunedin Public Art Gallery)
Rugby League in New Zealand: A People’s History by Ryan Bodman (Bridget Williams Books)*
Thoughts: Also only halfway there with this category. Gone are two of my shortlist predictions: Pacific Arts Aotearoa edited by Lana Lopesi, and Ngā Kaihanga Uku: Māori Clay Artists by Baye Riddell; remaining are the Binney and the Fungi. Lynn Freeman, convenor of judges for this category says: “This has been the year of the art book, lavishly illustrated, lovingly researched and written, insightful, profound and beautiful artworks in their own right. Here, too, are under-appreciated (until now) stories that provide invaluable contributions to our understanding of what it means to be a New Zealander.”
Well, New Zealanders are very much there for Liv Sisson’s Fungi. At an event in Wellington last weekend Sisson (alongside the effervescent Nicola Toki, author of Critters of Aotearoa) commanded a long and enthusiastic book signing queue. It’s smart publishing from Penguin NZ: Sisson’s field guide rides the fungi wave started by Entangled Life (by Mervan Sheldrake, 2020) but in specifically Aotearoa fashion – the book is a gateway to our own weird shroomy backyard.
It’s hard to imagine the Illustrated Non-Fiction category without Te Papa Press but here we are. Bridget Williams Books has made it through, though with Bodman’s Rugby League in New Zealand; and Dunedin Public Art Gallery has pleasingly lingered with Marilynn Webb: Folded in the Hills, the publication that accompanied the major retrospective of the artist’s work between 1960s and the early 2000s.
I’m still picking the Binney to win, purely because of Gregory O’Brien’s immersion: the journey of the book is so thorough and so cared for.
General Non-Fiction Award ($12,000 prize)
An Indigenous Ocean: Pacific Essays by Damon Salesa (Bridget Williams Books)
Laughing at the Dark: A Memoir by Barbara Else (Penguin, Penguin Random House)
Ngātokimatawhaorua: The Biography of a Waka by Jeff Evans (Massey University Press)
There’s a Cure for This: A Memoir by Emma Espiner (Penguin, Penguin Random House)*
Thoughts: The biggest cull of all. Judges had to deduce four worthy books from a pile of 14 as some kind of compromise for the fact that we don’t have a creative non-fiction category. This list is the result: two memoirs up against two scholarly works. I was not on the same page as the judges here with only one of my predictions sliding in: Salesa’s An Indigenous Ocean, which I still have pegged to win.
Jim Tully ONZM, convenor of judges for this category, says: “The judges came to the unanimous decision that the final four represent the best of the best – accessible yet robust academic inquiries; novel and unheard stories; and narratives that warm, sadden and unsettle all within the same cover.”
Barbara Else’s and Emma Wehipeihana’s memoirs are certainly standouts. Else’s writing is exemplary; in her review on The Spinoff, Michele A’Court wrote: “It is as perfect a thing as you might expect from a writer who is also an editor. She tells us she does not approve of the adverb (I am now terrified of them) and by god she does a good simile. ‘I feel like a crumpled thing that you find behind the clothes-drier, so crusty with dust that even if you wash it and find out what it is you might not want it.'”
Wehipeihana’s memoir is arresting. In her review, Chloe Fergusson-Tibble writes: “Reading There’s a cure for this I’m reminded of essays by New Zealand author Lana Lopesi, author of Bloody Woman, a book about indigenous female wisdom. And as Emma dissects the whakapapa of medicine, I’m transported to Zadie Smith’s essays, which I find deeply intellectual, obscuring and darkly funny. Mostly, though, I’m reminded that there is a place for me in medicine and that everything is going to be OK.”
How will the judges compare memoir to works of scholarship such as Salesa’s and Evans’? I’m standing by An Indigenous Ocean to win: the breadth and intelligence of it feels monumental in this moment. But, who knows. We will find out which fork in the road the judges decide to travel when the winners are announced at a live ceremony on 15 May at the Auckland Writers Festival.
Good luck one and all. May the odds be ever in your favour.
Kudos to the judges:
The Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction will be judged by reading advocate and former bookseller Juliet Blyth (convenor); writer, reviewer and literary festival curator Kiran Dass; and fiction writer Anthony Lapwood (Ngāti Ranginui, Ngāi Te Rangi, Ngāti Whakaue, Pākehā). They will be joined in deciding the ultimate winner from their shortlist of four by an international judge.
Judging the Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry will be poet, critic and editor Erik Kennedy (convenor); poet and performance writer Tru Paraha (Ngāti Hineāmaru, Te Kahu o Torongare ki Waiomio, Ngāti Te Tarawa); and author, editor and university lecturer Dougal McNeill.
The General Non-Fiction Award will be judged by journalist and academic Jim Tully ONZM (convenor), writer, editor, broadcaster and literary festival curator Kerry Sunderland; and academic, researcher and author Rebecca Kiddle (Ngāti Porou, Ngā Puhi).
The Booksellers Aotearoa New Zealand Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction will be judged by former radio broadcaster and book reviewer Lynn Freeman (convenor); arts advocate and former festival director Marianne Hargreaves; and artist, curator and writer Ane Tonga.
All of the above books can be ordered through Unity Books Wellington or Unity Books Auckland today.