Buy your tickets now for the 2025 New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults to join the celebration of the best books of the year for young New Zealand readers. You’ll get to meet the finalists and applaud the winners at an exuberant awards ceremony in the characterful Pipitea Marae on Wednesday 13 August.

Forty-seven gifted children’s writers, illustrators and translators are finalists in this year’s awards. Their achievements will be acknowledged on the night by publishers, politicians, booksellers, librarians, media and supporters of the children’s literature community. Members of the public are welcome to purchase tickets too.

Winners in the 2025 New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults will be announced in six categories: Picture Book (the BookHub Award), Junior Fiction (the Wright Family Foundation Esther Glen Award), Young Adult Fiction, Non-Fiction, Illustration (the Russell Clark Award) and Te Reo Māori (the Wright Family Foundation Te Kura Pounamu Awards).

One of the category winners will be named the night’s supreme winner of the Margaret Mahy Book of the Year. The judges will also present the NZSA Best First Book award to a previously unpublished author or illustrator from a shortlist of five titles.

All guests with tickets are also invited to the post-ceremony function in the Pipitea’s wharekai, with food and refreshments served from 8.30pm to 10.00pm.

This is a popular event with a limited number of seats, so book your place today and enjoy this wonderful celebration of Aotearoa’s very best children’s literature.

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New Zealand Book Awards for Children & Young Adults Ceremony 2025

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