Bloody victory for author Michael Bennett in Ngaio Marsh Awards

Thursday, 25 September 2025

The 2025 Ngaio Marsh Awards winners, clockwise from left: author Michael Bennett, for his novel Return to Blood; Wendy Parkins, for her debut novel The Defiance of Frances Dickinson; and Kirsty Johnston and James Hollings, for their non-fiction book The Crewe Murders.

Screenwriter and author Michael Bennett has won the Ngaio Marsh Award for best novel for Return to Blood, the second story in his acclaimed detective series.

Winners of the awards, which celebrate excellence in crime, thriller, mystery, suspense and true crime writing in Aotearoa New Zealand, were unveiled at Christchurch’s Tūranga library on Thursday evening.

Bennett’s novel was praised by the judges for having “excellent characters, nuanced plot, [and] important themes”.

It is his second to feature detective Hana Westerman, following his 2022 debut novel Better the Blood, which won the 2023 Ngaio Marsh Award for best first novel. Carved in Blood, the third in the series, was released earlier this year.

Dame Ngaio Marsh, pictured at a book signing in Wellington in 1972 for her book Tied up in Tinsel, is regarded as one of the four “queens of crime” from the golden age of detective fiction.

Bennett, who was born in Reefton but now lives in Auckland – and who wrote and was executive producer of the TVNZ series Vegas – previously won the best non-fiction award in 2017 for In Dark Places, which examined the wrongful conviction of Teina Pora for the murder of Susan Burdett in 1992.

Other winners included The Crewe Murders in the best non-fiction category, authored by former Stuff investigative journalist Kirsty Johnston and Massey University Associate Professor of Journalism James Hollings.

The book re-examines the murders of Harvey and Jeannette Crewe in a Pukekawa farmhouse in 1970, which remain unsolved despite two trials, two appeals and a royal commission finding of police corruption.

Wendy Parkins’ book The Defiance of Frances Dickinson was named best first novel, following in the footsteps of luminaries such as JP Pomare, Jacqueline Bublitz and last year’s winner, Claire Baylis.

Parkins’ novel was praised by judges who said it “soaks readers in an era and attitudes which have some scary echoes today”.

Now in their 16th year, the Ngaio Marsh Awards, supported by WORD Christchurch, were established in 2010 by journalist and legal editor Craig Sisterson.

They are named after Dame Ngaio Marsh, one of the four “queens of crime” during what is regarded as the golden age of detective fiction. Ngaio Marsh lived and worked in Christchurch.