Catherine Chidgey Makes History – Again

Multi-award-winning writer Catherine Chidgey’s new novel, Pet, has shot to number one on the New Zealand bestseller list after only two days on sale.

The chilling psychological novel, set in a Catholic primary school in the 1980s, is followed on the bestseller list by another Chidgey page-turner, The Axeman’s Carnival, making her the first ever New Zealand writer to simultaneously take the number one and two positions.

The Axeman’s Carnival has been continuously in the top 10 since publication in October 2022 and won the $64,000 Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the Ockham New Zealand Book awards. Chidgey won the same prize in 2017 for The Wish Child, the first time a writer has won the prize twice.

Newsroom’s Steve Braunias revealed that the last time an author came close to Chidgey’s double-bestseller pole position was in 2013 when Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries was number one, and her previous novel The Rehearsal at number three.

Catherine Chidgey and Eleanor Catton are both published by Te Herenga Waka University Press.

The Press’s publisher Fergus Barrowman says he is thrilled to see Catherine’s spectacular success continue 25 years after the publication of her first book.

“Catherine has been a major literary talent right from her 1998 debut novel In A Fishbone Church which won Best First Book at the New Zealand Book Awards.

“It’s an honour to publish both Eleanor and Catherine, and to see such gifted writers taking the top three bestseller positions.

“This is testimony to the value of Te Herenga Waka–Victoria University’s long-term support for New Zealand writing and publishing. “

Chidgey’s Pet will be published internationally next month and is receiving early praise, with the US Crimereads.com calling it: ‘the most anticipated crime fiction of summer 2023’. Booklist US critic Merle Jacob stated: ‘lovers of Donna Tartt’s The Secret History will want to read this compelling novel by an award-winning New Zealand author.’ In the UK, Pet was selected as July’s Book of the Month in The Bookseller Preview.

Chidgey’s previous titles also received international accolades. In a Fishbone Church won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (South East Asia and South Pacific), the UK Betty Trask Award and was longlisted for the Orange Prize; her second novel Golden Deeds was a Notable Book of the Year in the New York Times Book Review and a Best Book in the LA Times; her 2020 novel, Remote Sympathy, was shortlisted for the DUBLIN Literary Award and the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction, and was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction.

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