Family chronicles: The novels of Maurice Gee

Maurice Gee, the New Zealand novelist, is not a prolific writer; during some twenty years he has produced only a handful of novels and one collection of short stories. Nor, it seems true to say, has he been widely known outside his own country. All his novels have been published in England first, but even there, where New Zealand writers have some· times managed to establish a firm reputation whilst remaining prophets in their own land, his work has attracted no wide-spread attention.