Creeks and Kitchens

Widely regarded as one of New Zealand’s greatest fiction writers, Maurice Gee has written virtually no non-fiction. The exceptions are the two exquisite childhood reminiscences combined here into a memoir in this BWB Text.

In this little known work, Gee describes in fascinating detail his boyhood and family life in West Auckland and offers illuminating insights into some of the creative forces which have driven some of his fiction: the creek with its dangers – where, he writes, he glimpsed ‘sex and death’ – the kitchen with his mother preparing dinner in the gathering dark, and his elderly uncle, later the model for the magnificent Plumb.