Author

Fiona Kidman (DNZM,OBE) has written over 30 books, including novels, short stories, poems and memoir. Her damehood is in recognition of her contribution to literature. Her work is widely known in France and she has also been recognised by the French government with the French Legion of Honour and a knighthood in Arts and Letters (Chevalier des Artes et des Lettres).
Her novel This Mortal Boy won the Jann Medlicott Ockham Book Award for Fiction in 2018. She has been the recipient of the Katherine Mansfield Award (in Menton), the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Fiction, the Ngaio Marsh Award for Crime Fiction, the New Zealand Heritage Award for Fiction. Her latest book is So Far For Now (Penguin Random House 2022). Photo credit: Robert Cross

Author

Charlotte Grimshaw is the author of seven critically acclaimed 
novels, two outstanding collections of short stories and a memoir, The Mirror Book, finalist in the 2022 Ockham Book Awards. She has been awarded the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship and the BNZ
Katherine Mansfield Award. Her story collection Opportunity was shortlisted for the Frank O’Connor International Prize, and won the Montana Award for Fiction, along with the Montana Medal for Book of the Year. Her story collection Singularity was also shortlisted for the Frank O’Connor International Prize. Her novel, The Night Book, was a finalist for the New
Zealand Post Award. She is a columnist and reviewer for the New Zealand Listener. She has won a Qantas media award for her columns, and won the 2018, 2019 and 2021 Voyager Media Awards Reviewer of the Year. Her bestselling novels The Night Book and Soon were made into the TV miniseries, The Bad Seed.

Author

Caroline (Te Uri O Hau / Pākehā) is an award-winning memoir and fiction writer, manuscript assessor and story consultant, book reviewer and writing teacher. Her debut, Ripiero Beach: A Memoir 

of Life After Near Death 

(Bateman, May 2020) won the 2020 New Zealand Heritage Literary Award for Best Non-fiction Book. She holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Auckland (2015) plus a journalism degree and, in a previous life, owned and ran Nova—a leading model and talent agency. Her debut novel, Golden Days (Affirm Press, Australia), is on shelves in March 2023.

Caroline is a Creative New Zealand funding assessor, creative writing teacher, and was a board member for the Michael King Writers Centre from 2017 to 2021, where she headed the residency selection committee. 

She has been a columnist for North & South, and her work has been published by Landfall, Awa Wahine, Three Lamps Journal, Author, Next, New Zealand Herald and more. 

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Chair

Cate Prestidge is a Principal Academic in the School of Media Arts, Wintec -Te Pukenga.

Originally from Timaru, she studied English, theatre and education at Otago University. She taught in Dunedin and in Orange NSW and worked in media for Rural Press Ltd. She came to Kirikiriroa with her family in 2007 and moved into tertiary teaching while completing her M.Ed.

Cate is enthusiastic about working in education and enjoys connecting her students to the many opportunities in the region. She also loves theatre and works as a critic, writing reviews for a range of media platforms. She was a long-time judge for Stage Challenge, including national and international competitions, and is a current breakfast host on Free FM community radio.