A heavyweight battle has been laid out for the richest prize in New Zealand literature.

The finalists have been named for the Ockham NZ Book Awards and - fittingly - the contest for the $65,000 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction has a prize-fighter feel to it.

Three former winners of the much-vaunted category and another award-winning writer have all made the final four.

Damien Wilkins is one of the most decorated authors in the awards history, winning back in 1994 with The Miserables and finishing as a runner up twice (2001 and 2007). Now, 34 years after he last stood on top of the fiction mountain - and with a far more lucrative financial incentive - he's back in the running with Delirious.

2013 Book of the year winner Kirsty Gunn is hoping to emulate the success of her novel The Big Music with this year's shortlisted entry - short story collection Pretty Ugly.

Laurence Fearnley is another who has enjoyed success with the country's top fiction prize back in 2011 for The Hut Builder, and is a finalist again with At the Grand Glacier Hotel.

The only author in the fiction final four who hasn't already won the prize is Tina Makereti (Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāti Rangatahi-Matakore, Pākehā) with The Mires - but she is no stranger to success, having previously won the 2016 Commonwealth Writers Short Story Prize.

They've edged some extraordinary writers to get to the shortlist, with the likes of former winner Becky Manawatu and Carl Shuker missing out.

Thom Conroy, convenor of judges for fiction prize, states this year’s fiction shortlist features "dazzling" works that address some of the most relevant themes facing society right now: climate change, race relations, mobility, sexism, immigration and ageing.

“Whether set in the Scottish Highlands, at the Fox Glacier, or on the Kāpiti Coast, each of these finalists evoked a visceral and often lyrical sense of place.” 

Conroy and fellow judges Carole Beu and Tania Roxborogh (Ngāti Porou) will be joined by well-credentialed international judge Georgina Godwin to decide on the winner.

The quartet of shortlisted fiction writers are among 16 finalists announced in the Ockham NZ Book Awards across four categories - whittled down from the 43 who made the long-list.

The hotly contested Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry is headlined by a true icon of the industry - with 92 year-old poet, essayist and novelist C.K. Stead showing age is no barrier to literary vision, looking to add another gong to his incredible collection with In the Half Light of a Dying Day.

He's up against award-winning poet and novelist Emma Neale with Liar, Liar, Lick, Spit, literary polymath Robert Sullivan's Hopurangi - Songcatcher: Poems from the Maramataka and Slender Volumes from poet and song writer Richard von Sturmer.

Poetry award convenor of judges David Eggleton explains “We sought to argue, debate and rationalise - and eventually harmonise - our choices; pitting militant language poets against equally militant identity poets, spiritual poets, polemical poets, experimental poets and careful traditionalists in pursuit of acknowledging books of literary excellence at the highest level.” 

Nine first-time authors made the Ockhams longlist - but only two advanced to the shortlist, both in the General Non-Fiction Award.

Flora Feltham's Bad Archive and Una Cruickshank's The Chthonic Cycle are both in the final four with two academic entries; Richard Shaw's The Unsettled: Small Stories of Colonisation and Hine Toa: A Story of Bravery by Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku (Te Arawa, Tūhoe, Ngāpuhi, Waikato).

It's a phenomenal achievement, the debut authors outlasting the longest of the longlists for the 2025 edition, including former Book of the Year award-winners Airini Beautrais, Vincent O'Malley and Diana Witchel.

Holly Walker, convenor of judges for the General Non-Fiction category, says memoir and creative non-fiction were abundantly represented this year.

“The four shortlisted titles span a wide range of subject matter – from the collective amnesia of settler colonialism to the specifics of fabric weaving, from a personal history of feminist and Māori activism to the scientific history of ambergris – but they all share something in common: the bravery to confront big, scary, existential questions, and to report back on the experience in ways that make meaning for readers."

In the running for the BookHub Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction are four senior curators at Te Papa: Athol McCredie (Leslie Adkin: Farmer Photographer); and Matiu Baker, Katie Cooper, Rebecca Rice and museum research associate Michael Fitgerald (Te Ata o Tū The Shadow of Tūmatauenga: The New Zealand Wars Collections of Te Papa). They are up against former Book of the Year winner Jill Trevelyan and her co-authors Jennifer Taylor and Greg Donson (Edith Collier: Early New Zealand Modernist); and eminent academics and authors Deirdre Brown, Ngarino Ellis and the late Jonathan Mane-Wheoki (Toi Te Mana: An Indigenous History of Māori Art).

Chris Szekely, convenor of judges for the BookHub Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction, says history and art dominated the field in this category, with the panel saluting these books’ erudite and well-researched narratives and information-rich, educative texts.

“As to be expected, illustrations were high-calibre, well-matched with text, and all marvellously presented through outstanding design."

The winners of the Poetry, General Non-Fiction and Illustrated Non-Fiction categories will pocked $12,000 - with the winners, including the four Mātātuhi Foundation Best First Book Awards recipients, revealed on 14 May during the 2025 Auckland Writers Festival.