Landed & grounded - WRITER SUE'S NEW PASSION

The other compelling half to her life story is down on the farm!

- Wendyl Nissen

When Sue McCauley's first book Other Halves hit New Zealand shelves in 1982, it caused a big stir. Sue wrote about a woman wanting a better life for herself than being married with a child in the suburbs and ultimately led to a relationship with a troubled Māori teenager.

It was semi-autobiographical and Sue has been with her partner Pat Hammond for 50 years, since she met him as a lost and mistreated teen. "When I wrote it, not for a minute did I actually think we'd be together all these years," says Sue, who is now 81, while Pat is 66.

"But we're very fond of each other and maybe having to put up with a lot at the start in those early years made sure that we were invested in the relationship. So you look at each other and say, 'Look, we've been through that why chuck it away now?""

Other Halves was a big seller and it was made into a movie in 1984. Meanwhile, Sue continued to write novels, short stories, a biography, and drama for stage and television. She has also helped other writers as a mentor and editor.

Now her latest novel Landed has just been published and it reads very much like her first novel, with her main character a woman in her sixties whose husband commits suicide, leaving her with no money and the need to create a new life in the 1980s.