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McCullough, Colleen (1937-)
Australian novelist
Born in Wellington, New South Wales, Australia, and trained as a scientist, she is generally regarded as Australia's most notable romance writer, although she herself disputes this categorization of her work. The Thorn Birds (1977), a family saga and her second novel, established McCullough as a popular writer when it became a bestseller and, later, the basis of a television adaptation. This historical fiction focuses on the Clearys, a family of Irish Catholics who, at the beginning of the novel, languish in poverty in New Zealand but eventually become neo-colonial aristocrats on Drogheda, a property in western New South Wales, Australia. The Thorn...