Maria Gill is an award-winning published author of children’s books. She trained as a teacher and journalist and has a master’s in creative writing. She writes full-time in a seaside village north of Auckland, New Zealand. Her ancestors came from Australia; she attended High School on the Gold Coast, and most of her relatives live in Brisbane. Australia is her second home. Since teaching at primary and intermediate schools, Maria has been a full-time author for the past 22 years and has had an impressive 62 children’s books published over that time both for the trade and the international educational market.

Books that have been published on both sides of the Tasman include:

Anzac Animals (now available in paperback) - true tales of the astonishing and heart-warming true tales of 20 unforgettable animal friends that helped the ANZACs serving in World War One and Two.

Remarkable Animal Stories in New Zealand and Australia - meet Migaloo the ghostly white humpback, a twelve-year old koala whisperer, a cat who swims in a dog-racing competition, a kangaroo who prefers home comforts, and a platypus who sunbathes in a Gold Coast wildlife park.

Abel Tasman: Mapping the Southern Lands – meet the explorer who first put Australia and New Zealand on the world map.

ANZAC Heroes (Scholastic) - exciting tales of 30 Australian and New Zealand heroes during WW1 and WW2. It won the 2016 Best Non-fiction Book Award and the Book of the Year Award at the New Zealand Book Awards for Children & Young Adults.

Recent books include New Zealand’s Endangered Dolphins, with stunning illustrations; Queen of the Cosmos: Beatrice Hill Tinsley about one of New Zealand’s most famous scientists; Ernest Rutherford: Just an Ordinary Boy, also about a world-famous scientist; Epic New Zealand Adventurers, which includes Australian Paul Caffyn who kayaked around the whole of the Australia coast; Ice Breaker: An Epic Antarctic Adventure, about the Endurance ship capsizing in Antarctic and the crew’s journey to safety. Go to www.mariagill.co.nz to see more of her books and the educational resources that go with them.

Along with the 2016 Book of the Year prize for Anzac Heroes, Maria has also received 13 Storyline Notable Book Awards, and was awarded the 2020 Margaret Mahy Medal for outstanding services to children’s literature. She has been facilitating author talks and workshops in schools for the last 20 years as an author and another 10 years as a teacher. Maria uses props (puppets, artefacts, posters), PowerPoint, and gets students interacting during her sessions with role-plays, question and answer, quizzes, and puppet performances. Maria also teaches workshops about writing biographies, animal stories, researching, creative non-fiction, and short story writing.