2017 Authors

Authors

From historian Anne Salmond in the Marlborough Sounds, to novelist Catherine Chidgey at Cloudy Bay, we were privileged to have amazing 11 authors for 2017 - check out selected podcasts...

Alice Galletly

Alice Galletly

Alice Galletly drank and blogged about a different beer every single day for a year to research her wonderfully witty and informative How to have a beer

Anne Salmond

Anne Salmond

Dame Anne Salmond makes history intriguing, exciting and highly relevant. An eminent anthropologist, historian, writer and environmentalist, Dame Anne shares her understanding of the Maori experience and how it shapes us all as New Zealanders.

Brian Turner

Brian Turner

Brian Turner is a former New Zealand Poet Laureate and one of this country's best loved poets. An ardent and accomplished sportsman, conservationist and champion of our wild places, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Otago in 2011. 

CK Stead

CK Stead

CK Stead barely requires introduction; he is an award-winning novelist, as well as a poet, literary critic, essayist and emeritus professor of English of the University of Auckland. 

Catherine Chidgey

Catherine Chidgey

Catherine received critical acclaim for her first three novels. Her very first In a Fishbone Church won the Best First Book at the New Zealand Book Awards. She has received numerous awards and fellowships. 

Emma Neale

Emma Neale

Emma Neale is an award-winning poet and prose writer, whose first novel Night Swimming was published in 1998, followed by her first collection of poetry Sleeve Notes in 1999. 

Gavin Bishop

Gavin Bishop

Gavin Bishop is an award-winning children’s picture book writer and illustrator. His nearly 70 published books range from original stories to retellings of Maori myths, European fairytales, and nursery rhymes. 

John Pickrell

John Pickrell

John Pickrell is an award-winning journalist, the former editor of Australian Geographic magazine and the author of Flying Dinosaurs, How Fearsome Reptiles Became Birds and more.

Joy Cowley

Joy Cowley

Joy Cowley is one of New Zealand’s best-loved writers for children and a Marlborough Living Treasure. Joy was made a Distinguished Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to children’s literature in 2005. 

Sarah Laing

Sarah Laing

Sarah Laing is a fiction writer, cartoonist, illustrator and graphic designer whose work is re-introducing adults to the graphic novel genre - comics - they loved as children. 

Tracey Slaughter

Tracey Slaughter

Tracey's short fiction has received numerous awards, including the international Bridport Prize 2014, a 2007 NZ Book Month Award, and BNZ Katherine Mansfield Awards in 2004 and 2001. 

Journalists

We were lucky to feature four award-winning journalists at this year's festival...

Charles Anderson

Charles Anderson

Charles Anderson’s work has appeared in the International New York Times, the Guardian, the Sydney Morning Herald and National Geographic Traveller

Mike White

Mike White

Mike White has been a journalist for 20 years and has reported from many countries, including Afghanistan and Iraq. 

Naomi Arnold

Naomi Arnold

Naomi Arnold is an award-winning freelance journalist who writes regularly for New Zealand GeographicWilderness, Fairfax, and The Spinoff

Nikki Macdonald

Nikki Macdonald

Nikki Macdonald is a senior feature writer at The Dominion Post. For the love of journalism, she has eaten hospital food for a week & reported from the inside of a nuclear reactor. 

Interviewers

This year we had six interviewers set to talk with our group of authors - a number of regulars were joined by several new hands...

Charlotte Patterson

Charlotte Patterson

With a love of reading along with wellness and food, Charlotte spoke to Nicola Galloway about simple, nutritional cooking.

Jane Forrest Waghorn

Jane Forrest Waghorn

Jane Forrest Waghorn, once a librarian and still a passionate reader, is a regular interviewer at the festival. This year she talked with a range of authors.  

Mike White

Mike White

Mike White has won more than 20 Qantas and Canon media awards, and has been New Zealand Feature Writer of the Year three times. A regular at our festivals, he interviewed several authors in 2018. 

Nikki Macdonald

Nikki Macdonald

Nikki Macdonald is a multi award-winning senior feature writer at The Dominion Post. She interviewed a number of authors this year. 

Rae Heta

Rae Heta

Marlborough-based, Rae spoke with Glenn Colquhoun about medicine, magic and poetry at Cloudy Bay winery.

Ron Crosby

Ron Crosby

A Marlborough historian and lifetime court lawyer, Ron has published a number of important books himself and spoke with Atholl Anderson.

Tessa Nicholson

Tessa Nicholson

With a background in journalism and editing, Tessa Nicholson is an avid reader in her leisure time and a regular interviewer at our festivals. This year she got in depth with a number of authors.