2025 Ngaio Marsh Award Best Novel longlist announced
The longlist for this year’s Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Novel, which celebrates Aotearoa New Zealand crime, mystery or thriller writing has been announced.
The longlisted titles are:
- Return to Blood (Michael Bennett, S&S)
- The Hitchhiker (Gabriel Bergmoser, HarperCollins)
- A Divine Fury (DV Bishop, Macmillan)
- Leave the Girls Behind (Jacqueline Bublitz, A&U)
- Woman, Missing (Sherryl Clark, HQ)
- Hell’s Bells (Jill Johnson, Black & White)
- The Mires (Tina Makereti, Ultimo)
- A Fly Under the Radar (William McCartney, self-published)
- Home Truths (Charity Norman, A&U)
- 17 Years Later (JP Pomare, Hachette)
- Okiwi Brown (Cristina Sanders, The Cuba Press)
- A House Built on Sand (Tina Shaw, Text)
- The Call (Gavin Strawhan, A&U)
- Prey (Vanda Symon, Orenda)
- Dead Girl Gone: The Bookshop Detectives 1 (Gareth & Louise Ward, Penguin).
Ngaio Marsh Awards founder Craig Sisterson said, ‘While we named Aotearoa’s awards after one of the legendary Queens of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, this year’s longlistees – and our entrants more broadly – clearly demonstrate the depth, diversity, and evolution of our local take on crime, mystery, and thriller writing.’
The finalists for Best Novel, as well as the finalists for Best First Novel, and Best Non-Fiction will be announced in August, with winners announced 25 September.
Category: Awards Local news
