About the Author

Jessie Munro grew up on a farm near Kawakawa Bay and went to school in Clevedon and Papakura before studying languages and history at the University of Auckland. A former Commonwealth Scholar, she is the author of the acclaimed biography The Story of Suzanne Aubert, Book of the Year in the 1997 New Zealand Montana Book Awards. Jessie came to the McNicol Homestead in 2008 to begin research for this book and found herself immersed in an ever-growing, intensely rewarding story. Her abiding love for Clevedon - people and place - has grown stronger than ever in the writing of Voices of Belonging.