2020 Ngaio Marsh Awards Announced

 Through the eyes of children: debut tales win Ngaio Marsh Awards

Fresh voices came to the fore at WORD Christchurch Spring Festival on Saturday afternoon as Becky Manawatu and RWR McDonald were named the winners of the 2020 Ngaio Marsh Awards.

Both winners were first-time novelists, and while their winning books were different in many ways, each was told in large part from the perspective of young children dealing with loss and violence in small-town New Zealand, each included a rich cast of diverse characters, and each expertly blended lighter moments with dark events in tense tales that could make readers gasp and laugh.

Manawatu (Ngāi Tahu) scooped the Best Novel prize for AUĒ (Makaro Press), a novel infused with domestic violence and gang life, told from the perspectives of eight-year-old Arama, his teenage brother Tauriki, and young woman Jade. She’s the first debut author to win Best Novel since 2010.

"A breath-taking expose of lives lived on the margins, and the fight for redemption and absolution,” said the judges. “Manawatu doesn’t use crime as a plot device but shows it woven into the fabric of her characters’ lives, defining them, sometimes destroying them, and serving as a perverse unifier.”

AUĒ joins THIS MORTAL BOY by Fiona Kidman as the only novels to have won both the Ngaio Marsh Award and the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.

RWR McDonald grew up on a sheep and deer farm in South Otago, and now lives in Melbourne with his two daughters and extended rainbow family. He won the 2020 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best First Novel for THE NANCYS (Allen & Unwin), an exuberant small-town murder mystery where eleven-year-old Tippy Chan teams with her visiting uncle and his boyfriend to solve the murder of her teacher.

“Hilarious and inventive; the dynamic between the young protagonist and the adult characters is unusual and special,” said the judges. “A clever hat-tip to one of the most indelible female characters in the genre, and a story that blends crime and humour in unexpected ways.”

It’s a little surreal to realise this is the tenth anniversary of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, said founder Craig Sisterson. The awards were established in 2010 to celebrate excellence in local crime, mystery, thriller, and suspense writing. Sisterson noted that the Ngaios were modelled somewhat on the Hammett Prize in North America, which has been won by the likes of Margaret Atwood and focuses on ‘literary excellence’ in novels entwined with crime, so isn’t restricted to detective novels or whodunnits.

“We’ve been blessed to have some extraordinary books to consider and celebrate over the past decade, and this year has further added to the growing depth and diversity of local crime writing.”

Becky Manawatu received a trophy and $1,000 courtesy of WORD Christchurch. McDonald won a trophy and cash prize from the Ngaio Marsh Awards. “We feel very fortunate to have been able to hold a real life event before a live audience to celebrate our finalists and winners this year,” said Sisterson. “Huge thanks to Rachael King and WORD Christchurch for all their hard work in such a challenging year, as well as for their ongoing support every year since we launched in 2010.”

CRAIG SISTERSON ON FRESH BLOOD FROM THE ENDS OF THE EARTH

Next month the winners of the 2017 Ngaio Marsh Awards will be announced in Christchurch, New Zealand, the hometown of Dame Ngaio Marsh, one of the four Queens of Crime of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.

Although Dame Ngaio set most of her Inspector Alleyn tales (32 novels and several short stories) in Britain, she was ‘a Kiwi’, a colonial author from the far ends of the Empire.

So it’s only appropriate that the literary prizes for New Zealand crime, mystery, and thriller writing, which I helped establish back in 2010, bear her name and image.

From the very beginning, we’ve been proud to have an association with Shots! Magazine: columnist Mike Ripley brought his expertise to our nascent awards as one of the founding judges, and in recent years Ayo Onatade has been part of the international judging panel.

So I’m very glad to visiting Shots! blog today as part of our inaugural Ngaio Marsh Awards blog tour, and sharing with you all some more information about some of our finalists.

It’s been great to see the growth in New Zealand crime writing over the past few years, with several dozen new authors joining the #yeahnoir ranks (the term for Kiwi crime writing), both debut authors and authors from other genres making a switch to the dark side.

Today, I thought I’d share a bit more about our finalists in the Best First Novel category, which celebrates the best crime writing from first-time authors. We had a record number of entrants this year, and lots of good reads didn’t make the finalist list. But here’s a closer look at our ‘final five’; all great new voices with tales that span the crime writing spectrum.

DEAD LEMONS by Finn Bell (ebook)

This powerful and fascinating tale starts with a cliff-hanger, literally. Wheelchair-bound main character Finn is hanging from the side of a cliff above roaring seas in New Zealand’s rural south. He’d moved from the big city after wrecking his marriage, then his spinal column, with his drinking. Contemplating ending it all, he muddles along thanks to a blunt counsellor, new friends, and a growing obsession to uncover what happened to a father and daughter who vanished years before from the remote cottage in which Finn now lives.  Bell really hits the ground running with his debut; he has a strong narrative voice that brings plenty of freshness. There’s a zing to his writing, and he’s unafraid to take a deep-dive into the psychological, as Finn grapples with the demons in his own mind. Is he worthless, a ‘dead lemon’ merely bringing down those around him? Or does he have something to offer?

RED HERRING by Jonothan Cullinane (HarperCollins)

Kiwi filmmaker Cullinane blends mystery and history in this terrific debut. Readers are plunged headlong into 1950s New Zealand, where global politics are being played out in clashes between unions and business interests on the waterfront. The shadow of the Second World War, with its death and deprivation, still lingers. A growing spectre of Communism domino-ing its way down through Asia looms. New Zealand may be small and far away, but to plenty of power brokers it’s a battleground. One they want to control.  Into this murky world steps Johnny Molloy, a soldier turned private eye who leaned hard left in the past. Hired to track a supposedly dead man, he crosses paths with an ambitious reporter looking to make her mark, and the pair find themselves knee-deep in the muck. Cullinane weaves a fascinating noir tale textured by lesser-known aspects of Kiwi history. There's a muscularity and dry humour to his storytelling. A page-turner with much more.

 THE ICE SHROUD by Gordon Ell (Bush Press)

Distinguished wildlife photographer Gordon Ell brings his passion for nature to his first swing at fiction, setting this intriguing murder mystery against the backdrop of New Zealand’s spectacular Southern Lakes region. A woman’s body spotted by jet-boating tourists, half-frozen in a river canyon, is an abrupt introduction for new CIB head DS Malcolm Buchan. Especially when he recognises the woman; a fact he hides from his new colleagues.  As Buchan and his team investigate, they cross paths with powerful locals, people that feel their wealth and influence should reign, and whatever they do in private is no-one else’s business. Ell infuses his tale with a great sense of place, while also delivering with interesting characters and a fascinating storyline. A bit of a modern Kiwi take on a classic British village murder mystery, with detectives stymied by secretive locals and the wealthy elite. Full of suspects and red herrings, Ell’s debut is a heartily enjoyable read set in a gorgeous location.

THE STUDENT BODY by Simon Wyatt (Mary Egan Publishing)

Former detective Wyatt brings all his investigative experience to bear in this page-turning police procedural set on the ‘wild west coast’ of New Zealand’s biggest city, a place of beaches and bushlands on the outskirts of the high-rise CBD and its suburban sprawl.  A popular teenager is strangled at a high school camp, and newly promoted DS Nick Knight, who jettisoned his legal career to join the police, is thrust into a high-profile investigation. The crime seems sexually motivated, and there are plenty of secrets to unpick among the girl’s family, friends and school teachers, and the wider community. Fans of police procedurals that delve deeply into the inner workings of a police investigation will really enjoy this debut, as Wyatt delivers a real sense of authenticity and lots of detail about how modern police forces operate, issues they have to consider, and the challenges they face.  A fast-paced procedural set on the far side of the world.

DAYS ARE LIKE GRASS by Sue Younger (Eunoia Press)

This is an atypical crime novel, an elegant and emotional read that’s a deep character study and more about the lingering impact of criminal acts, and ongoing mysteries, rather than a traditional detective tale. It’s the kind of book that sticks with you, that days later you’ll still be pondering the choices characters make, the varying outcomes, and questions of justice.

Paediatric surgeon Claire Bowerman reluctantly returns to Auckland from London with her fiancée and teenage daughter, only to find her complicated past flaring up, threatening everything she’s carefully built. When a family refuses medical treatment for their tumour-stricken child, Claire is in the media glare, the sins of her own father resurrected.  Starting with a past crime that haunts the entire book, Younger’s debut is peppered with moments of crime and mystery, and packed with drama with a capital D. It has a lovely page-turning quality, deeply drawn characters, and a nice touch for the contemporary Auckland setting and landscapes.