The Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry was awarded to Helen Heath for Are Friend’s Electric? “Helen Heath’s collection impressed the judging panel with its broad thematic reach, its willingness to tackle complex issues, and its poetic risk-taking,” said the judges.
Helen is a PhD graduate from the International Institute of Modern Letters (IIML) at Victoria University of Wellington.
VUP also dominated the best first book awards this year, taking out three prizes.
The Jessie Mackay Prize for a best first book of Poetry was awarded to Tayi Tibble for Poūkahangatus. Tayi Tibble was awarded the Adam Foundation Prize in Creative Writing by Victoria University of Wellington’s IIML in 2017.
The E.H. McCormick Prize for a best first work of General Non-Fiction was awarded to Chessie Henry for We Can Make a Life—a memoir about the Christchurch and Kaikōura earthquakes.
The Judith Binney Prize for a best first work of Illustrated Non-Fiction was awarded to John Reid for Whatever It Takes: Pacific Film and John O’Shea 1948-2000.
VUP publisher Fergus Barrowman says, “We’re really proud of the debut books that have won recognition tonight. It’s also very pleasing to see our poetry list doing so well, and wonderful for Helen’s collection to take the top poetry prize.”