Susan Cambridge

Susan Cambridge is an award-winning author of short stories, historical fiction, and history. She has written and published a historical novel ‘Bound by Sea’; edited and published a collection of letters from WW11: ‘Flies, Sand and Unwashed Socks’; and written a history of the Roadshow Trust: ‘What’s Done is Done’.

She is currently working on a book of linked stories about the strong women in her ancestry. Several of these stories have been in the finals of short story awards in New Zealand and Australia.

Her story ‘The Meeting’ won the Graeme Lay 202 Short Story Competition.

For two years she was secretary for the Canterbury Branch of NZSA.

Genre:

  • Adult Fiction

Skills:

  • Short Story Writing

Branch:

Canterbury

Location:

Christchurch

Publications:

Bound by Sea, convicts and merchants, an Australian family

Margaret Murrell, daughter of two convicts, born on Norfolk Island, marries a merchant in New South Wales and rises in colonial society to have her portrait painted at the French Court of King Louis Philippe. The novel opens with the convicts. Joseph Murrell aged ten suffers the brutality of the hulks and Newgate Prison, to be transported on the infamous Second Fleet to New South Wales. He and Ann Carty make a fragile life in the harsh regime of Norfolk Island. This well-researched true story tells of convicts and cruelty, merchants and wealth, loss and hardship. It features sealing gangs, storms, trade and politics, royalty and gold. The main characters are historical figures, brought to life against the background of colonial development and the struggles of a convict colony growing into a nation.

Flies, Sand and Unwashed Socks, letters from WWII

These letters and photos are from Egypt, Greece, Syria, Libya, Tunisia, Italy. Dick Harris travelled huge distances in North Aftica, the Middle East and Southern Europe. For more than three years he lived with bombing from the air and shelling from the ground. He manoeuvred guns and ammunition, lived in slit trenches and tents, talked with people from other cultures and learned the skills of radio operation. It changed his life forever. This is his story, told in his own words and the story of many New Zealanders who set out to defeat tyranny.

What's Done is Done, The story of Roadshow

This is the story of an innovative presentation in 1983 of road safety education. Tears, laughter, music, songs, film and dance burst on the stage in an explosion of information, argument and entertainment. Readers will find a story of dedicated people pushing the boundaries to follow their vision of changing the driving culture in New Zealand.