New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults winners

In Aotearoa New Zealand, Ross Calman (Ngāti Toa, Ngāti Raukawa, Kāi Tahu) has won the overall Margaret Mahy Book of the Year Award at the 2025 New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults for The Treaty of Waitangi (Oratia Books).

Calman also won the Elsie Locke Award for Nonfiction. Judging convenors Mat Tait and Feana Tu‘akoi said, ‘The Treaty of Waitangi is a miracle of concision without sacrificing complexity. It is written clearly and inclusively without avoiding uncomfortable truths.’

The winning titles in each category of the 2025 awards, chosen from shortlists announced in June, are:

Margaret Mahy Book of the Year Award ($8500)

• The Treaty of Waitangi (Ross Calman [Ngāti Toa, Ngāti Raukawa, Kāi Tahu], Oratia Books)

BookHub Picture Book Award ($8500)

• Titiro Look (Gavin Bishop [Tainui, Ngāti Awa], translated by Darryn Joseph [Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Rereahu], Gecko Press)

Wright Family Foundation Esther Glen Award for Junior Fiction ($8500)

• Detective Beans and the Case of the Missing Hat (Li Chen, Penguin)

Young Adult Fiction Award ($8500)

• The Paradise Generation (Sanna Thompson, umop apisdn press)

Elsie Locke Award for Nonfiction ($8500)

• The Treaty of Waitangi (Ross Calman [Ngāti Toa, Ngāti Raukawa, Kāi Tahu], Oratia Books)

Russell Clark Award for Illustration ($8500)

• Hineraukatauri me Te Ara Pūoro (illustrated by Rehua Wilson [Te Aupouri, Te Rarawa], written by Elizabeth Gray [Ngāti Rēhia, Ngāti Uepōhatu, Tama Ūpoko ki te awa tipua, Ngāti Tūwharetoa anō hoki], Huia Publishers)

Wright Family Foundation Te Kura Pounamu Award for a Book Originally Written in Te Reo Māori ($8500)

• Hineraukatauri me Te Ara Pūoro (Elizabeth Gray [Ngāti Rēhia, Ngāti Uepōhatu, Tama Ūpoko ki te awa tipua, Ngāti Tūwharetoa anō hoki], illustrated by Rehua Wilson [Te Aupouri, Te Rarawa], Huia Publishers)

Wright Family Foundation Te Kura Pounamu Award for a Book Translated into Te Reo Māori ($8500)

• A Ariā me te Atua o te Kūmara (written by Witi Ihimaera [Te Whānau a Kai, Rongowhakaata, Te Aitanga a Mahaki, Ngāti Porou], translated by Hēni Jacob [Ngāti Raukawa], illustrated by Isobel Joy Te Aho-White [Ngāti Kahungunu, Kāi Tahu], Puffin)

NZSA Best First Book Award ($2500)

• The Raven’s Eye Runaways (Claire Mabey, A&U Children’s NZ).

Last year’s awards saw Stacy Gregg [Ngāti Mahuta, Ngāti Pūkeko, Ngāti Maru Hauraki] win the overall Margaret Mahy Book of the Year Award and the Esther Glen junior fiction award for the junior novel Nine Girls (Penguin).

The 2025 winners were announced during a ceremony at Wellington’s Pipitea Marae. More information about the awards is available on the New Zealand Book Awards Trust website.

Pictured: Ross Calman (Ngāti Toa, Ngāti Raukawa, Kāi Tahu). Credit: Book Awards Trust, Vijay Paul.

Category: Awards Local news