Forty-four titles have been announced for this year's Ockham New Zealand Book Awards longlist.
Nine debut authors appear in the list — three in each of the poetry, illustrated non-fiction and general non-fiction categories — including Dame Jacinda Ardern for her memoir, A Different Kind of Power.
Ten books have been nominated for the coveted Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction, including two-time winner Catherine Chidgey for her ninth novel, The Book of Guilt, which was the subject of an international bidding war.
The other titles in the fiction category include Airana Ngarewa’s The Last Living Cannibal about a reimagined 1940s Taranaki, Grey Lynn-set 1985 by Dominic Hoey and Duncan Sarkies’ Star Gazers - a political thriller about alpaca breeders.
Late last year, it was decided entries in the category by distinguished authors Elizabeth Smither and Stephanie Johnson would be ruled out of contention because their covers were generated with artificial intelligence.
However, the New Zealand Book Awards Trust later relaxed their ruling, allowing the books to enter the fiction category of awards.
“It is essential that entries to New Zealand’s national book awards, and especially to the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction, which has a $65,000 prize, be made with all due care,” Trust chair Nicola Legat said in a statement released early December.
“However, in this instance the collateral damage done has been to two very fine authors, and so it is with this in mind that the Trust has decided that it should allow their entries.”
At the time, Johnson told Morning Report she understood why they wanted to draw a line in the sand as the industry grapples with the alarming rise of AI, but she argued the literary work should outweigh concerns about a fictional book's cover.
The Trust stood by its decision to introduce the AI rule to the 2026 awards. However, some publishers said in December they they hadn't been given enough warning about it, so the Trust took this into account.
The winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction will receive $65,000 and each of the other main category winners will receive $12,000. Each of The Mātātuhi Foundation Best First Book winners (for fiction, poetry, general non-fiction and illustrated non-fiction) will be awarded $3000.
The Ockham shortlist will be announced on March 4, with winners celebrated on May 13 at the Auckland Writers Festival.
Full list of nominees:
Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction
– 1985 by Dominic Hoey (Penguin, Penguin Random House)
– All Her Lives by Ingrid Horrocks (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– Before the Winter Ends by Khadro Mohamed (Tender Press)
– Empathy by Bryan Walpert (Mākaro Press)
– Hoods Landing by Laura Vincent (Ngāti Māhanga, Ngāpuhi) (Āporo Press)
– How to Paint a Nude by Sam Mahon (Ugly Hill Press)
– Star Gazers by Duncan Sarkies (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– The Book of Guilt by Catherine Chidgey (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– The Last Living Cannibal by Airana Ngarewa (Ngāti Ruanui, Ngā Rauru, Ngāruahine) (Moa Press)
– Wonderland by Tracy Farr (The Cuba Press)
Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry
– Black Sugarcane by Nafanua Purcell Kersel (Satupa‘itea, Faleālupo, Aleipata, Tuaefu) (Te Herenga Waka University Press)*
– Clay Eaters by Gregory Kan (Auckland University Press)
– E kō, nō hea koe by Matariki Bennett (Ngāti Pikiao, Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Hinerangi) (Dead Bird Books)*
– Giving Birth to my Father by Tusiata Avia (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– If We Knew How to We Would by Emma Barnes (Auckland University Press)
– Joss: A History by Grace Yee (Giramondo Publishing)
– No Good by Sophie van Waardenberg (Auckland University Press)*
– Sick Power Trip by Erik Kennedy (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– Standing on my Shadow by Serie Barford (Anahera Press)
– Terrier, Worrier: A Poem in Five Parts by Anna Jackson (Auckland University Press)
BookHub Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction
– Atlas of the New Zealand Wars: Volume One 1834-1864, Early Engagements to the Second Taranaki War by Derek Leask (Auckland University Press)*
– Books of Mana: 180 Māori-Authored Books of Significance edited by Jacinta Ruru (Raukawa, Ngāti Ranginui), Angela Walhalla (Kāi Tahu) and Jeanette Wikaira (Ngāti Pukenga, Ngāti Tamaterā, Ngāpuhi) (Otago University Press)
– Garrison World: Redcoat Soldiers in New Zealand and Across the British Empire by Charlotte Macdonald (Bridget Williams Books)
– Groundwork: The Art and Writing of Emily Cumming Harris by Michele Leggott and Catherine Field-Dodgson (Rongowhakaata, Ngāi Tāmanuhiri, Te Aitanga a Mahaki) (Te Papa Press)
– He Puāwai: A Natural History of New Zealand Flowers by Philip Garnock-Jones (Auckland University Press)*
– Mark Adams: A Survey – He Kohinga Whakaahua by Sarah Farrar (Massey University Press and Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki)
– Mr Ward’s Map: Victorian Wellington Street by Street by Elizabeth Cox (Massey University Press)
– Takoto ai te Marino: Selected Works 2018-2025 by Raukura Turei (Ngā Rauru Kītahi, Taranaki, Ngāti Pāoa, Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki), Greta van der Star, Vanessa Green and Katie Kerr (Raukura Turei)*
– The Collector: Thomas Cheeseman and the Making of the Auckland Museum by Andrew McKay and Richard Wolfe (Massey University Press)
– Whenua edited by Felicity Milburn, Chloe Cull (Ngāi Tahu, Ngāi te Ruahikihiki) and Melanie Oliver (Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū)
General Non-Fiction Award
– 50 Years of the Waitangi Tribunal: Whakamana i te Tiriti edited by Carwyn Jones (Ngāti Kahungunu, Te Aitanga-a-Māhaki) and Maria Bargh (Te Arawa, Ngāti Awa) (Huia Publishers)
– A Different Kind of Power by Jacinda Ardern (Penguin, Penguin Random House)*
– An Uncommon Land: From an Ancestral Past of Enclosure Towards a Regenerative Future by Catherine Knight (Totara Press)
– Everything But the Medicine: A Doctor’s Tale by Lucy O’Hagan (Massey University Press)*
– Hardship and Hope: Stories of Resistance in the Fight Against Poverty in Aotearoa by Rebecca Macfie (Bridget Williams Books)
– Northbound: Four Seasons of Solitude on Te Araroa by Naomi Arnold (HarperCollins Aotearoa New Zealand)
– Polkinghorne: Inside the Trial of the Century by Steve Braunias (Allen & Unwin)
– Ruth Dallas: A Writer’s Life by Diana Morrow (Otago University Press)
– The Covid Response: A Scientist’s Account of New Zealand's Pandemic and What Comes Next by Shaun Hendy (Bridget Williams Books)
– The Hollow Boys: A Story of Three Brothers & the Fiordland Deer Recovery Era by Peta Carey (Potton & Burton)
– The Middle of Nowhere: Stories of Working on the Manapōuri Hydro Project by Rosemary Baird (Canterbury University Press)*
– The Welcome of Strangers: A History of Southern Māori by Atholl Anderson (Bridget Williams Books and Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu)
– This Compulsion in Us by Tina Makereti (Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāti Rangatahi-Matakore, Pākehā) (Te Herenga Waka University Press)
– Tony Fomison: Life of the Artist by Mark Forman (Auckland University Press)
*represents debut authors
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