The Beat of the Pendulum: A Found Novel

Catherine Chidgey was born in Auckland, New Zealand. Her debut novel, In a Fishbone Church, won Best First Book at the New Zealand Book Awards as well as a Commonwealth Writers’ Prize. Her next novel, Golden Deeds, was named a Best Book of the Year in the Los Angeles Times and a Notable Book of the Year in the New York Times. Her novel The Transformation also won widespread acclaim, and The Wish Child won the New Zealand Book Awards fiction prize, the country’s biggest literary award. In 2003 she was named best New Zealand novelist under forty. She has degrees in German literature, psychology and creative writing, and is a member of the Academy of New Zealand Literature. She teaches creative writing at the University of Waikato, and lives near Hamilton with her husband and daughter.