Kelly Ana Morey is an award-winning novelist of Ngati Kuri and Pakeha descent. Born in 1968, she spent her early childhood in Papua New Guinea before attending boarding school in New Zealand. She graduated from Auckland with degrees in art history and creative writing, and wrote her first novel, Bloom, while unemployed in the Far North. She now lives in South Kaipara. Morey's previous novels include Bloom (Hubert Church Award: Best First Work of Fiction 2004) and Grace is Gone (Finalist Kiriyama Pacific Rim Fiction Prize 2004). She was also the inaugural recipient of the Janet Frame Literary Award for Fiction in 2005.