If 2023 was a cracker of a year for New Zealand fiction, with briskly selling novels at the more literary end from Eleanor Catton, Catherine Chidgey, Emily Perkins, Josie Shapiro, Airana Ngarewa and others, 2024 has been slightly quieter (reflected in gloomier overall sales – see below). We did, of course, see acclaimed new novels from Carl Shuker, Tina Makereti and Damien Wilkins, and new collections from Patricia Grace and Owen Marshall. Perkins’ Lioness took the big fiction prize at the Ockham Awards, ahead of finalists Catton, Pip Adam and expat Stephen Daisley. Even better, her book is set to be made into a TV series by the company that helped make the blockbuster Big Little Lies.
Also arriving this year were debut novels from Freddie Gillies, Anne Tiernan, Amy Brown, Erin Palmisano, Romesh Dissanayake and Saraid de Silva. And there were new books from Rachael King, Ngarewa, Nicky Pellegrino, Olivia Spooner and Avi Duckor-Jones.
Even though it also seemed a slightly quieter year for local thrillers, particularly new authors, screenwriter Gavin Strawhan published his debut and Michael Bennett, Charity Norman, Rose Carlyle and Jacqueline Bublitz brought out new books. In more good news for local book-to-screen adaptations, Bennett’s Hana Westerman books – a third is on its way in 2025 – are being made into a series for TVNZ.
If 2024 proved a tougher one overall for Kiwi book sales, there were some bright spots, such as “genre” fiction. But the always blurred line between what constitutes “commercial” and “literary” fiction became particularly evident this year, when Allen & Unwin took the word “commercial” out of the title of its fiction prize. Sometimes, of course, the word reflects writing style and quality and other times it means more that a book sells in respectable quantities. The publisher didn’t award the prize this year, saying entries weren’t quite up to scratch, and that many aspiring authors thought their books were literary even when they weren’t.
The winner in 2022, Josie Shapiro, has sold about 14,000 copies, the company reported, and 2023′s winner, Strawhan, has shifted about 10,000 copies so far. This is cause for much optimism, as these numbers eclipse the numbers that local novels usually sell, and both authors have new novels slated for release in 2025. Moa Press, a newish imprint of Hachette NZ, continues to do well in the mid-market. New novels from Tiernan, Palmisano and Katherine J Adams are on their way next year. It is a clear path to growth – one week earlier in the year, three Kiwi books were in the top 5 overall fiction list: Danielle Hawkins’ small-town comedy drama Take Two, Palmisano’s island idyll The Secrets of the Little Greek Taverna and Lauren Keenan’s 1860s drama The Space Between.
Shelves devoted to the Māori world continue to expand. Monty Soutar returned with the second of his Kāwai precolonial trilogy alongside Keenan, new books on the modern Māori experience from Shilo Kino, Michelle Rahurahu and Talia Marshall, a memoir from Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku, and poetry from Robert Sullivan and Stacey Teague. Books on Māori belief and wisdom keep growing, including Hana Tapiata, and Hinemoa Elder with two titles.
Among the year’s new non-fiction titles were stimulating essay collections from Airini Beautrais, Una Cruikshank and Flora Feltham. Local self-help continues to grow. Books arrived on how to break up, living a less stressful life, a more ethical life, guides to good health for women and ways to find calm and beat depression.
Romance, “romantasy” and YA continue to sell well. It’s not just the young reading them: a UK study commissioned by HarperCollins found more than a quarter of YA readers are over the age of 28.
According to one international booksellers study out this year, 40% of New Zealanders rate reading as a hobby, higher than the 18 other countries surveyed, which averaged 34%. However, the study also showed we bought and read a book in the past year slightly less than the other countries, perhaps reflected in lower sales volumes. Possibly because books are relatively expensive here, we buy more second hand than the country average (55% to 35%). Kiwis buy more in physical shops than average, too, liking the atmosphere and the ability to closely peruse books. The older we are, the more we prefer paper books, though 35-54-year-olds listen to audiobooks more than other age groups.
What sold in 2024
It was a gloomier picture for books this year. The total NZ book market was down about 4% in volume on 2023, according to Nielsen Bookscan, though NZ-published books were down further, about 7%. Driving the decline were lower non-fiction sales, which were down about 10%, reinforcing a global trend of recent years. NZ non-fiction actually did better than the total market, dipping only about 4% in volume.
Fiction has been the good news story of late, growing year on year, perhaps due to its ability to help readers escape from events global and national, as well as there being a raft of excellent novels from top writers. No doubt there is belt-tightening going on, with the economy having been effectively in recession for the past two years. Because after good growth in recent years, sales of NZ-published adult fiction were down about 4%, compared with about 1% across the total fiction market. Nielsen’s Nevena Nikolic says NZ fiction now occupies about 6.4% of the total market, a slight dip after a bump in 2023 that was largely thanks to sales of Catton’s Birnam Wood.
NZ-published children’s and young adult books actually suffered greater declines than the total children’s market, down nearly 10% compared with 2% across the market. “Normally, children’s titles are fairly recession-proof, but it doesn’t seem to be the case this year,” says Nikolic. NZ-published books currently make up about 14% of the total market.
The sales numbers of this year’s top 10 are well down on 2023. Last year, Prince Harry’s bestselling and pricier hardback Spare pushed up the total non-fiction market, as did Lucinda Riley’s last Seven Sisters title in fiction.
What Kiwi titles sold well this year? Genre fiction and the likes of true crime: Gareth and Louise Ward’s Bookshop Detectives, Soutar’s Kāwai sequel, Gangster’s Paradise by Jared Savage, The Final Diagnosis by Cynric Temple-Camp and Hannah-Rose Watt’s Wild Walks Aotearoa.
That NZ non-fiction did better than book sales in general is reflected in the year’s top-10 books – cookbooks, celebrity memoirs, peeks into unfamiliar worlds. The only novel on the list is The Bookshop Detectives: Dead Girl Gone at No 7.
It’s unsurprising The Last Secret Agent heads the NZ bestsellers for 2024, a solidly written, true-life spy story of derring-do and courage by an adopted Kiwi. It shifted nearly 9000 copies, and only three titles overall sold more.
TOP 10 NZ
1. The Last Secret Agent by Pippa Latour & Jude Dobson (A&U)
2. Tasty by Chelsea Winter (A&U)
3. View from the Second Row by Samuel Whitelock (HarperCollins)
4. The Life of Dai by Dai Henwood & Jaquie Brown (HarperCollins)
5. Aroha by Dr Hinemoa Elder (Penguin RH)
6. A Life Less Punishing by Matt Heath (A&U)
7. The Bookshop Detectives: Dead Girl Gone by Gareth & Louise Ward (Penguin RH)
8. Serviceman J by Jamie Pennell (HarperCollins)
9. Waitohu by Dr Hinemoa Elder (Penguin RH)
10. Whakawhetai by Hira Nathan (A&U)
TOP 10 OVERALL
1. The Women by Kristin Hannah (PanMacmillan)
2. The Hidden Girl by Lucinda Riley & Harry Whittaker (PanMacmillan)
3. Dog Man 12: The Scarlet Shedder by Dav Pilkey (Scholastic)
4. The Last Secret Agent by Pippa Latour & Jude Dobson (A&U)
5. My Favourite Mistake by Marian Keyes (Penguin RH)
6. Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros (Hachette)
7. Tasty by Chelsea Winter (A&U)
8. Safe Enough by Lee Child (Penguin RH)
9. In Too Deep by Lee Child & Andrew Child (Penguin RH)
10. It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover (Simon & Schuster)
