McCarthy, Maureen 1953-

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McCarthy, Maureen 1953-

PERSONAL:

Born March 27, 1953, in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

ADDRESSES: Agent—Booked Out Speakers Agency, P.O. Box 580, South Yarra, Victoria 3141, Australia.

CAREER: Writer and educator. Worked as teacher in secondary schools and has written scripts for television and educational films.

AWARDS, HONORS: W.A. Young Readers Book Award (WAYRA), 1997, for Queen Kat, Carmel and St. Jude Get a Life.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Ganglands, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1992.

Queen Kat, Carmel and St. Jude Get a Life (young adult), Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1995.

Chain of Hearts, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1999.

Flash Jack, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 2001.

When You Wake and Find Me Gone (young adult), Penguin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 2002.

Rose by Any Other Name, Allen & Unwin (East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia), 2006.

"IN BETWEEN" SERIES; JUVENILE FICTION BASED ON AUSTRALIAN TELEVISION MINISERIES

Alex, McPhee Gribble/Penguin (Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia), 1987.

Angie, McPhee Gribble/Penguin (Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia), 1987.

Saret, McPhee Gribble/Penguin (Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia), 1987.

Fatima, McPhee Gribble/Penguin (Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia), 1987.

In Between (includes Fatima, Saret, Angie, and Alex) Penguin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1998.

"MISSION TOP SECRET" SERIES; BASED ON EPISODES OF AUSTRALIAN TELEVISION SERIES

Cross My Heart, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

The Treasure of Cala Figuera, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

The Polish Pony Puzzle, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

Eagles from the East, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

The Falling Star, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

The Mona Lisa Mix-Up, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

The Flight of the Golden Goose, Puffin (Ringwood, Victoria, Australia), 1993.

Also scriptwriter for Australian television miniseries In Between, the documentary Eating Your Heart Out (1984), the children's television series Lift Off, and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation television comedy series C/O The Bartons. When You Wake and Find Me Gone was published in Slovenian.

ADAPTATIONS:

Queen Kat, Carmel and St. Jude Get a Life was adapted as a four-part miniseries, Trout Films, in association with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

SIDELIGHTS:

Maureen McCarthy is a former secondary schoolteacher who went on to write for Australian television shows and eventually novels. Most of her novels focus on teenagers, such as Ganglands, which tells about youth living in Melbourne and features a love story between a boy and a girl from a Greek and an Australian family. McCarthy moves from the big city to small-town life in Chain of Hearts, in which she tells the alternating stories of a soul-searching seventeen-year-old girl and her forty-something aunt. McCarthy has also written numerous books based on Australian television shows for which she was the scriptwriter, including In Between, which contains all four novels based on the television series of the same title. In a review on the CMIS Evaluation Web site, Kris Johnstone wrote: "It is the craft of McCarthy's writing and the depth of her characters that I most admire."

In her novel When You Wake and Find Me Gone, the author tells the story of Kit, who is attending college in Melbourne. When she goes home to see her sister who has been hurt in a car crash, she discovers that her sister is actually her mother and that her mother is really her grandmother. These discoveries lead her to seek out the truth about her past, including the identity of her real father, who lives in Ireland. "I enjoyed the book thoroughly and would recommend it highly to young adult readers who enjoy a strong plot which makes them think," wrote a contributor to the Gold Creek School Web site.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Callaghan, Paul, A Student's Guide to "In Between" by Mary McCarthy Wizard Books (Ballarat, Victoria, Australia), 2000.

Rucco, Alison, A Wizard Lit Master to Maureen McCarthy's "Queen Kat, Carmel and St. Jude Get a Life," illustrated by Mark Fox, Wizard Books (Ballarat, Victoria, Australia), 2000.