Marie Connolly has been an academic for over thirty years in university and government settings. An expert in child welfare she has published extensively, including twenty scholarly books, and has travelled the world undertaking research into child protection systems. She began her academic career at the University of Canterbury and has worked at senior levels of government in New Zealand. In 2010 she moved to Australia to take up a professorial Chair at the University of Melbourne. In 2019 she retired and returned to Aotearoa where she continues to write academic non-fiction, and has published six story books in the Our Backyard series of travel books for children. She has also contributed to and edited a book of Fantabulous Fables, published in 2023 by the Akaroa Community Arts Council. She lives in Akaroa with her partner George, and Dark Sky is her first murder mystery.