Margaret Mahy was a well-known New Zealand author of childrens and young adult books. While the plots of many of her books have strong supernatural elements, her writing concentrates on the themes of human relationships and growing up.

Her books The Haunting and The Changeover: A Supernatural Romance both received the Carnegie Medal of the British Library Association. There have 100 childrens books, 40 novels, and 20 collections of her stories published. Among her childrens books, A Lion in the Meadow and The Seven Chinese Brothers and The Man Whose Mother was a Pirate are considered national classics. Her novels have been translated into German, French, Spanish, Dutch, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Italian, Japanese, Catalan and Afrikaans. In addition, some stories have been translated into Russian, Chinese and Icelandic.

For her contributions to childrens literature she was made a member of the Order of New Zealand. The Margaret Mahy Medal Award was established by the New Zealand Childrens Book Foundation in 1991 to provide recognition of excellence in childrens literature, publishing and literacy in New Zealand. In 2006 she was awarded the Hans Christian Andersen Award (known as the Little Nobel Prize) in recognition of a lasting contribution to childrens literature.

Margaret Mahy died on 23 July 2012.

On 29 April 2013, New Zealand’s top honour for children’s books was renamed the New Zealand Post Margaret Mahy Book of the Year award.

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