Kate Morton is the award-winning, international bestselling author of seven novels: The House at Riverton (The Shifting Fog), The Forgotten Garden, The Distant Hours, The Secret Keeper, The Lake House, The Clockmaker's Daughter and, most recently, Homecoming. Her books are published in 38 languages across 45 territories and have all been #1 bestsellers around the world. The House at Riverton was one of the most successful UK debuts of all time.
"I started writing because I wanted to recapture the joy of reading as a child. As soon as I learned that the black marks on white pages were doorways, and that it was within my power to go through them (and beyond the back of the wardrobe), I was hooked. I read everything that I could get my hands on, and could usually be found hiding in one of the avocado trees in our garden, a stack of library books balanced on the bough beside me. I'm still chasing that feeling of complete immersion, which makes the real world disappear."
Kate Morton grew up on Tamborine Mountain, within the rainforests of South East Queensland. There, she attended a small country school, and spent much of her childhood inventing and playing games of make-believe with her sisters. After high school, Kate enrolled in a law degree, but her passion for theatre soon took over. She studied for, and earned, a Licentiate in Speech and Drama from Trinity College, London, and completed a summer Shakespeare course at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Kate continued to act in community productions whilst completing her Honours and Masters degrees in English Literature, before realising that it was words and storytelling that she loved more than performing.
"My mum was an antique dealer and she instilled in me a fascination with objects from the past. I used to wander around her shop, picking up rusty little tin boxes and old spoons, holding them in my hand and wondering at the many lives they'd led before they came to us. In the summer holidays, we would drive from Tamborine to Brisbane to visit my grandmother, and the one hour journey would easily stretch to three as Mum stopped at each of her 'favourite' second-hand shops along the way. Thankfully, I could always count on the dark back corner of the shop, where the tattered, pre-loved books had been haphazardly stacked, and where I was sure to find another treasure to add to my collection."
"I have an obsession with houses, both real and fictional, and have always been aware of them as places that collect memories. I adore the physical aspects - chimneys, attics, dormers, crooked roof lines, odd gables - and also the role of the house as a building in which human lives are led. The first house that I can well remember living in was on the mountain and we called it 'The Black House', because it was old, and the paint had long since flaked away from the hardwood weatherboards. It was surrounded by rainforest, and on the inclement day that we arrived, it appeared before us like a great, dark ship, clouds drifting through the open windows."
"I love reading to children and am yet to meet a child who doesn't want to be told a story. I have three sons and have read to each of them, and their school classes, over the years. There's something so essential about passing on a treasured story and seeing the same look of transportation on their faces that I remember feeling the first time I went down the rabbit hole. I love illustrated books and also thrill at being part of the 'chapter book' experience, when children realise that their imagination enables them to create pictures in their mind."
"I studied speech and drama when I was growing up, with a wonderful couple who lived near me on the mountain. He was Welsh and she English and although they were many decades older than I was, they became my dear friends, inspiring in me a love of theatre and storytelling. To this day, there are few things I love more than that moment of anticipation, when the house lights go down and the audience draws collective breath."
