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Do you love mysteries and thrills?The Ngaio Marsh Awards, in association with Auckland Libraries, invites booklovers to join a criminally good evening where five talented Auckland writers will discuss the art and craft of storytelling, creating memorable characters, the importance of setting, whether truth can be stranger than fiction, and what drew each of them to tales of murder, mystery, and mayhem.
Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Non-Fiction winner Steve Braunias is joined by psychologist and prolific mystery author Tannis Laidlaw, and award-winning debut crime novelists Rachel Paris and Gavin Strawhan. Auckland lawyer and Ngaio Marsh Awards judge Darise Bennington will cross-examine the offenders.
WHEN: Thursday, 1 May 2025
WHERE: St Heliers Library, 32 St Heliers Bay Road
WHEN: 6pm for light refreshments, 6.30pm panel discussion
Free entry.
RSVP: [email protected] or (09) 377 0209
Steve is an Auckland author, columnist, journalist, and editor. He has written 14 books, regularly contributed to many of Aotearoa’s leading newspapers and magazines, and won more than 40 national awards, including for sports writing, crime writing, travel writing, humour, food writing, and book reviewing. His books include CIVILISATION, which won the 2013 NZ Post Award for Best Book of Non-Fiction, and MISSING PERSONS, which won the 2023 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Non-Fiction. His latest book, THE SURVIVORS, completes his ‘crime trilogy’.
Tannis is a prolific Auckland novelist and former psychologist who worked in private practice, mental health facilities, and the prison service. Tannis has always been fascinated by the human condition, not only in those with crossed wiring but also when ordinary people are driven to behave in extraordinary ways. Her fiction reflects her psychological background. She is the author of the Madeleine Brooks mystery series, the Darkwater Lake mysteries, and several standalone mysteries and thrillers.
Rachel came to writing after a successful 20-year career in law, specialising in fintech and working as a commercial lawyer in London and Auckland. She holds a Master of Laws from Harvard and a Master of Creative Writing from the University of Auckland, where she won the inaugural Phoenix Prize for best manuscript. Her debut novel SEE HOW THEY FALL, a pacy psychological thriller set in contemporary Sydney, is published in March 2025.
Gavin is an award-winning writer, producer, and showrunner of many New Zealand and international shows. Originally from Australia, he was Shortland Street’s first script editor and head writer, and co-created hit local shows Go Girls and Nothing Trivial. He was also showrunner and writer of the critically acclaimed mystery thriller This Is Not My Life, and Australian crime drama Hyde & Seek. THE CALL, Gavin’s debut novel, won the 2023 Allen & Unwin Fiction Prize for an unpublished manuscript.
Darise is a book-loving West Aucklander and a litigation and dispute resolution expert at one of New Zealand's leading law firms. She's a regular Mystery in the Library chair, appeared onstage at Rotorua Noir, and is a Ngaio Marsh Awards judge.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
St Heliers Community Library (Saint Heliers), 32 St Heliers Bay Rd, St Heliers, Auckland 1071, New Zealand,Auckland, New Zealand
