Author Paula Morris was teaching an MA class at the University of Auckland, when her mobile phone rang and as it was a Wellington number she didn’t recognise, she stepped outside to take the call.

Minutes later, she had to return to the creative writing class and resist the temptation to tell her students – and the rest of the world – that she would next year travel to Menton, in the South of France, as the 2018 Katherine Mansfield Fellow.

Weeks of secrecy end today, with the Arts Foundation officially naming Morris as the recipient of the prestigious residency, which allows a New Zealand writer to live for up to six months in Menton. While there, writers have access to the writing room in Villa Isola Bella where acclaimed NZ author Katherine Mansfield once lived.

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