Barbara Else

Barbara Else, also known as Barbara Neale, is a writer, editor, and playwright.

She was born in Invercargill, New Zealand, but moved to Wellington aged two, and has lived in various parts of New Zealand, also in San Diego, California.

She currently lives in Dunedin.

She has written novels for adults and children, plays, short stories and articles and has edited anthologies of children’s stories. She has received several awards and fellowships including the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to literature, the Storylines Margaret Mahy Medal and the Victoria University of Wellington’s Writer’s Fellowship.

She graduated with an MA from Otago University and has worked as a university tutor, an editor and a freelance writer She has served on the New Zealand Book Council and on the National Council of the New Zealand Society of Authors

Barbara Else and her husband, Chris Else, were instrumental in setting up both the New Zealand Association of Literary Agents and the New Zealand Association of Manuscript Assessors

She was a judge for the New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults in 2004 and Judge Convenor for the 2014 New Zealand Children’s Book Awards and has appeared at local and international writer and reader festivals.

She works as a literary agent and manuscript assessor with Chris Else, who is also a writer, as is her daughter Emma Neale.