Home Contact us Publications. My Profile I was born and grew up just out of Christchurch in a little place called Riccarton. Well, it was a village then with lots of open paddocks and farmland surrounding the housing. Today it's almost part of the city. Growing up in the South Island gave me a rich collection of experiences and images: the snow on the mountains, the autumn colours, the north-west winds - having to push my bike home as the payoff for an express ride to school.
One of my most vivid memories is of walking among the blossom trees in Hagley Park. There was a gateway out of the grounds of the old nurses' home at Christchurch Hospital and as student nurses my friends and I often escaped into the haven offered by the park.
Another special place was the beach at Sumner. Once three of us fell asleep lying on our towels in the sun after night duty and got so badly sunburnt that we had to report in sick. We were "meant to be responsible seniors" flatting away from the hospital at the time and I can still remember being lectured like a soldier who'd gone AWOL.
The reprimand was easy to brush off, the pain of starched uniforms and hard collars on our blistered skin wasn't. I also spent hours sitting on the rocks at Sumner watching my boyfriend surf. After we got married we shifted north to my in-laws' sheep and beef farm with its postcard beaches on the coast near Whangamata.
Our three children were all born at Waihi Hospital and our daughter was three months old when we shifted to Helensville. After two years' dairy experience we bought the dairy farm here in Tapuhi. Life on the farm with a river that flooded and three adventurous children was a great background for a budding writer.
