NZ Society of Authors – Northland Branch Members’ Profiles

Committee

Sherryl Clark – Chair

She has published more than 70 books for young readers, including five verse novels. Her verse novel, Mina and the Whole Wide World, won the 2022 Prime Minister’s Award for Children’s Books in Australia. Her other books have won Notables, the NSW Premier’s award and an Honour Book in the CBCA Awards.

After teaching in the Diploma of Professional Writing & Editing at Victoria University TAFE in Melbourne for more than 20 years, Sherryl decided to focus on her writing and her freelance editing business. A Kiwi from the North, she originally went to Australia to work for three months and stayed for 40 years, returning here in 2022 in time for Cyclone Gabriel and three metres of rainfall. But she is finally able to call herself a gardener instead of a plant killer. Her writer’s websites are at www.sherrylclark.com and www.sherrylclarkcrimewriter.com

Deputy Chairperson – Deb Jowitt

Treasurer – Justine Baddeley

After completing a semester on NorthTec’s Diploma of Applied Writing in 2010 Justine sent her picture book assessment to HarperCollins, who published it and released Tea With Miss Tilly illustrated by Phillip Webb in March 2012. On 20^th August 2011 she also had a profile piece on country singer Carleen Still published in The Northern Advocate. Then in 2017 Wendy Pye Publishing released her reader All Dressed Up.

Having completed the NorthTec Level 5, 6 and the advanced Applied Writing Diploma Level 7 at the end of 2012, Justine went on to complete her Creative Writing degree with Massey. She is lucky enough to have returned to where it all began, and is now a tutor at NorthTec on the diplomas she once studied. Justine continues to write a Young Adult fantasy based in Whangārei about shape shifters, angels and creatures of nightmares, and the odd children’s picture book.

Justine lives with her husband, youngest daughter, two cats, and three cockatiels which keep her busy, while still renovating (on a shoestring) twenty years after buying a house advertised as Nightmare on George Street.

Secretary

Minutes Secretary – Lesley Marshall

Community Liaison and Publicity

Newsletter Editor – Trish Fenton

Committee – Heather Whelan

Heather Whelan writes freelance articles, mainly about travel. She is currently published most months in Motorhomes, Caravans & Destinations.  Previous articles have appeared in the New Zealand Listener, the New Zealand Herald and Wilderness and Next magazines.  Heather also writes for the UK market and has been published in The Lady, This England, Evergreen, Welsh Country, Derbyshire Life, Practical Boat Owner and many other yachting magazines, including in the USA and Australia.

Heather has written an art book for teachers, Smart Art, and a picture book, The Crazy Idea.

Current projects include a travel memoir about sailing from England to New Zealand and a junior novel set in the 1800s.

Northland Branch Members

Zana Bell

Zana Bell writes in a variety of genre, her novels covering YA, historical adventure, and contemporary romance. Her second novel based on Charlotte Badger – convict, pirate and New Zealand’s first known English woman migrant – won the Cataromance Single Title’s 10 Best Books of 2008. In 2010 she won the Cataromance Reviewers’ Award for her romance, Tempting the Negotiator. She has also written short stories and articles that have appeared in publications such as Landfall, NZ Geographic, Takahe, Grace and History Scotland as well as being broadcast on National Radio. In 2000 she was awarded a Creative New Zealand grant and was the recipient of a National Archives Oral Histories grant in 2002. In 2006 she worked with Elizabeth Smither under the NZ Society of Authors Mentor Scheme and was shortlisted for the NZSA Mid-Careers Grant in 2012. In 2014 she was awarded a Vice Chancellor’s scholarship to complete a PhD in Creative Writing at AUT.

Donna Blaber

Donna Blaber writes fiction and non-fiction for children and adults. She is an experienced journalist, magazine editor and author. Her career includes working as the road trip editor for a popular NZ car magazine, the chief editor of a motorhome mag, and as the launch editor of a new renovation magazine. She is widely published and for four consecutive years her feature articles made the finals of the Cathay Pacific Travel Media Awards. In 2013 she won Creative Northland’s Excellence in the Arts Business Award.
Donna’s first book was commissioned in 2004; since then she has produced more than 40 titles. When she is not writing she teaches creative writing workshops for children. She is also available for writer visits as part of the Book Council’s Writers in Schools programme http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/Writers/Profiles/Blaber,%20Donna
While the majority of her work is published by mainstream publishers, she also runs a boutique publishing company which publishes, markets and distributes the popular Kiwi Critters® series of books for young children.

Narine Groome

Narine taught juniors as a primary teacher for years, which motivated her to write for children. In 2009 Penguin published her children’s picture book, Wheelbarrow Wilbur, realising a dream. She has 20 more children’s books waiting and wishes she could draw!

Currently, she is writing her first full-length play for a PANZ competition, 90 minutes in length. It’s ready to send, so she’s feeling chuffed! She has recently had some success with plays for PANZ – spaced out over a long time. Her play, A Word in Edgeways, was third in a PANZ competition last year, and another adult play, A Bag of Flour, was second in a PANZ competition in 2005. She has been re-motivated to try her hand at playwriting, and is enjoying the genre.

Jac Jenkins

Jac privately believes that her greatest writing accomplishment was the highly commended award for tidy writing that she won in primary school, as her hand-writing is usually exceptionally poor. Luckily she now does all of her creative writing on her laptop. Squeezing her writing between her two library jobs can be challenging, however she found time to win the Northland Short Story of the Year in both 2012 and 2013. She has had work published in the Northern Advocate, National Poetry Day in Northland and Flash Frontier and in 2012 was awarded a poetry mentorship through the NZ Society of Authors. Jac is also a member of the Northland poetry group, Take Flight.

Jac lives in rural Whangarei with her daughter, five hens and two cats. She and her partner live 3 ½ hours apart, yet somehow manage to spend most weekends together in one house or the other.

Sun Lyoung Kim

Sun Lyoung Kim was born in Seoul, Korea and immigrated to New Zealand in 1996. She has lived in Whangarei for 18 years. She graduated from NorthTec in 2006 with the Diploma in Applied Writing and was awarded the PEN prize from the New Zealand Society of Authors, Northland Branch. Since 2010 she has been writing educational columns on ‘Delicious Education’- a subsidiary company of Cho Sun Il Bo.

She published ‘Becoming a Kiwi’ in School Journal Part 1 Number 2, 2006 – and ‘Walking on the Grass’ in School Journal Part 1 Number 4, 2006.From 2006 to 2007 she has published columns on a Korean web newspaper about New Zealand and in 2005 published an article about a Korean folktale story in Whangarei Report. She is currently working on translating David Hill’s book, ‘Right Where it Hurt’ into Korean.

Anne McDonell

Anne worked as a speech language therapist and special needs teacher for 30 years. She has written poetry, published mainly in School Journal and literary magazines, and three educational books: Speech and Language Development 0-7 Years, Let’s Write Poems and Let’s Write Short Stories. She has won a Northland short story competition and poetry competition and her poems have been anthologised. In 2012 Anne decided to take on the challenge of writing a junior novel. The MOB and The Robbers, a novel for 9 to 11-year-olds, was published by Ocean Books in March 2013.  Thanks to NZSA, Anne had Janice Marriott as her mentor while writing this book.

Highlights of Anne’s writing career have been: visiting schools as a member of the Book Council’s Writers in Schools programme, travelling to schools in the Far North with Margaret Mahy and Northland writers, viewing children’s reactions to and artists’ illustrations of her work.  Her work has been translated into Maori and interpreted by the Auckland Symphony Orchestra.

Wendy Megget

Wendy Megget writes non-fiction, self-help and humour. She is a regular contributor to Kiwi Gardener Magazine and has also been published in NZ Fishing News. Her first eBook, The Little Bullying Book, is available online and she is now working on her new Weird Wisdom self-help series. In secret she is also developing a comic strip called Bongo’s Backyard. Wendy works as a Licensed Cadastral Surveyor and enjoys reading murder mysteries, gardening and collecting inspirational quotes.

Julie O’Brien

Julie is a qualified editor and journalist and works as a freelance editor offering editing, proofreading and writing services. She works primarily with non-fiction material from short documents to lengthy publications, including academic work and website copy. As she has also had a career in counselling and psychotherapy, she specialises in texts in these fields and in self-help books. Julie is also drawing on her psychotherapy experience to write a book about the process of personal change and its relationship to wider social change. For more information go to www.julieobrienediting.co.nz

Rae Roadley

Rae Roadley lay sprawled on a gravel road after being thrown by a bull – and had an idea. She’d write about her life on a farm situated on a remote and historic harbour peninsula. Her newspaper columns led to Love at the End of the Road, a memoir published by Penguin, which in turn led to an episode of New Zealand’s longest-running TV show, Country Calendar. A qualified journalist with experience in publishing and public relations, she’s also a freelance and creative writer, blogs about farming and rural life and tutors online non-fiction and feature writing at NorthTec. Rae’s work has been recognised in fiction contests and media awards.