Maurice Gee (b. 1931) achieved early success as a fiction writer with such titles as the novels The Big Season (1962) and In My Father's Den (1972) and the short story collection A Glorious Morning, Comrade (1975). Plumb (1978) brought a new level of acclaim, sustained by such later books as Meg (1981), The Burning Boy (1990), Going West (1992) and his most recent, Live Bodies (1998) (winner of the Montana New Zealand Book Award). He is also a successful children's writer, with Under the Mountain (1979) and others. He was awarded an Honorary DLitt of Victoria University in 1987.