Stacy Gregg
Stacy Gregg (Ngāti Mahuta/Ngāti Pukeko/Ngāti Maru Hauraki) grew up in Ngāruawāhia, where Nine Girls, her multiple-award-winning children’s novel, is set. Nine Girls, published by Penguin, won the supreme Margaret Mahy Book of the Year Award at the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults 2024. Stacy’s latest book The Last Journey, published by Simon and Schuster UK, is in bookstores from July 3. Stacy has previously published 32 middle-grade fiction novels with HarperCollins UK and remains HarperCollins New Zealand’s third best-selling children’s author of all-time, after David Walliams and Dr Seuss. Her Pony Club Secrets series has sold over 1.5 million copies globally in English alone and later became the CBBC TV series Mystic, which ran for three seasons. Stacy's second series Pony Club Rivals continued to define and dominate pony genre fiction before she moved into stand-alone hardbacks. Stacy’s screenwriting credits include Mystic and the Acorn TV series, My Life Is Murder, starring Lucy Lawless. Stacy lives in Auckland, New Zealand.
2025 festival sessions
An hour with Stacy Gregg
Stacy Gregg in conversation with Rae Heta
2:30pm-3:30pm, Saturday 19 July, Whitehaven Room, ASB Theatre, $25
Stacy Gregg joins Rae Heta to talk about her latest works Nine Girls, released last year, and The Last Journey, to be released in July. Nine Girls is the story of a Māori girl growing up in Ngāruawāhia in the late 1970s and early ’80s. Rich in themes of identity, friendship, and cultural heritage, the book is loosely inspired by Stacy’s own childhood. The Last Journey is a beautiful and heart-achingly sad animal adventure with cats and a strong environmental message. The book was born from the destruction of Auckland’s Anniversary weekend floods, which saw Stacy’s home inundated with water, forcing a year-long relocation while it was repaired. Stacy was inspired by her burmilla kitten named Alexander Pusskin who inveigled his way into the feline social circle in the new cul de sac. Stacy says The Last Journey is her most heartbreaking story yet: “It’s about finding inner reserves of strength that you never knew you possessed as a new and unexpected journey presents itself and you have no choice but to take it.”
Small Cats, Big Big Journeys - Young Readers' Session
Stacy Gregg presentation
1:00pm-2:00pm Sunday 20 July, Marlborough Library at Te Kahu o Waipuna - free session
Stacy introduces her very new book The Last Journey, a beautiful story she was drawn to write after watching her own cat break into the social life of cats on a new cul de sac after the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods forced her family to move houses temporarily. Stacy talks about how you can create and gestate your own stories out of real-life events – oh and CATS! A session for young readers, recommended 8-13-year-olds.