Author. A successful journalist and writer of children's books and radio scripts, she shall probably be better remembered for her 1948 debut novel "The Harp in the South". Raised in Te Kuiti, New Zealand, she showed early evidence of literary talent, though her formal education was limited by her family's financial difficulties. An opportunity to write for the "San Francisco Examiner" having been cancelled by the onset of World War II, she married writer D'Arcy Niland (1917-1967) in 1942 and settled in Sydney. Begining that same year, she wrote for the radio series "The Wide-Awake Bunyap", changing the name to "The Muddle-Headed Wombat" in 1951 and continuing until 1970, while producing a series of children's books based on the show's characters between 1962 and 1982. Though busy raising her children and supporting them with her radio work and frequent newspaper articles, she found time to write novels, winning a "Sydney Morning Herald" writer's competition in 1946 with "The Harp in the South". Though not published until 1948, probably due to its controversial depiction of Sydney slum life, the work became a best seller, has been translated into 37 languages, and has remained continually in print. Park penned a 1949 follow-up, "Poor Man's Orange", and was eventually to publish over 30 novels, ending with 1991's "James". She also produced two autobiographies, "A Fence Around the Cuckoo" (1992) and 1993's "Fishing in the Styx", as well as a 1995 biography of her husband. She received many honours for both her adult and juvenile works including a 1977 Miles Franklin Award for "Swords and Crowns and Rings"; in 1987 she was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM). Park lived her final years in Sydney and died of the complications of advanced age.