Mākaro Press is a New Zealand publisher based in

Wellington Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the third-largest city in New Zealand (second largest in the North Island ...

. It was founded in 2013 and has published several award-winning books including ''Auē'' by Becky Manawatu.

History

Mākaro was founded in 2013 by novelist and editor Mary McCallum and her son Paul Stewart. McCallum had been editing an anthology of writers from

Eastbourne Eastbourne () is a town and seaside resort in East Sussex, on the south coast of England, east of Brighton and south of London. It is also a non-metropolitan district, local government district with Borough status in the United Kingdom, bor ...

and decided to publish it herself, with her son joining to assist with the project. Over the first five years of its operation, Mākaro published over seventy books in a variety of genres including both fiction and non-fiction. In 2014 it published the best-selling ''The Book of Hat'' by Harriet Rowland, a young woman suffering from terminal cancer, which received a Storylines Notable Book Award and was a finalist in the non-fiction category at the 2015

New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults The New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults are a series of literary awards presented annually to recognise excellence in children's and young adult's literature in New Zealand. The awards were founded in 1982, and have had severa ...

. Rowland died shortly after the book was released. In 2018, McCallum and Stewart decided to focus on publishing New Zealand debut fiction, because of the challenges faced by first-time novelists in New Zealand. Together with Sarah Bolland, they set up a separate publisher called the Cuba Press to focus on other works, and Mākaro pivoted to publishing one fiction book per year. Since its change in direction, Mākaro has published three books that won top awards at the

Ockham New Zealand Book Awards The Ockham New Zealand Book Awards are literary awards presented annually in New Zealand. The awards began in 1996 as the merger of two literary awards events: the New Zealand Book Awards, which ran from 1976 to 1995, and the Goodman Fielder Wa ...

: ''Auē'' by Becky Manawatu (winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction and the award for best first book in 2020), ''Victory Park'' by Rachel Kerr (winner of the award for best first book in 2021), and ''The Sound of Breaking Glass'' by Kirsten Warner (winner of the award for best first book in 2019). ''Auē'' also won the 2020 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Crime Novel. ''Auē'' had been rejected by several publishers before being accepted by Mākaro, and the editing process took a year, with six revisions.

Publishing awards

In 2020, Paul Stewart received the Young NZ Publisher of the Year for his work with Mākaro and the Cuba Press. Mākaro Press won the Nielsen Book Publisher of the Year at the Aotearoa Book Industry Awards in 2021. The judging panel described the publisher as having "made outstanding contributions to NZ literature".

References

External links

Official website
{{Authority control Book publishing companies of New Zealand 2013 establishments in New Zealand Publishing companies established in 2013 Mass media in New Zealand