Maggie Rainey-Smith

Maggie Rainey-Smith is a novelist, poet, short story writer, essayist and book reviewer. She lives in Wellington, New Zealand.

Biography Maggie Rainey-Smith was born in 1950 in Richmond, Nelson. Her father, Reginald Mervyn Rainey, had served with the 2nd NZ Expeditionary Force in World War II and was taken prisoner in Crete and held in Stalag VIIB in Poland.

She grew up in Richmond and later travelled widely overseas, including to the United States, England, Scotland and Norway, afterwards returning to New Zealand and setting up a recruitment consultancy business. and has also completed the Aoraki Writing Course in Timaru under Owen Marshall in 2001, the Whitireia Advanced Diploma in Writing in 2003 and two undergraduate writing workshops at Victoria University of Wellington.

In November 2007, while researching for her next book, she spent some time in Greece and met Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor on the occasion of his Name Day celebration, a day on which he always opened his home in Kardamyli to the local villagers. After his death, she posted some of the photographs taken that day as a tribute to him and a memory of such a special day.

She has served as Chair of New Zealand Society of Authors (NZSA) Wellington, and presented a paper on this experience ("Reading short stories in prison") at the Dan Davin Short Story Conference in Invercargill in September 2017.

She teaches ESOL Workplace English to migrants and refugees, and appeared at the Auckland Writers Festival in 2016.