I grew up in a big family of nine children and our parents were great believers in the value of a roster. Mary-anne Scott and her sixth novel, which is based on a true family story (Photo: Supplied) I left the parcel inside the door for later. Just as I was about to drive back to Mum, I noticed a parcel on the doorstep from my publishers at OneTree House and knew the advance copies of my new book, The Tomo, had arrived. Let the tide come in and go out you are where you should be. My heightened sense of anxiety must have seeped into my text because the reply read: The beach will be here, waiting for another time. Later that day, when more of my siblings gathered to hold Mum’s hand, I went home to put the perishables back in the fridge and message my friends to say I wouldn’t be meeting them. They hadn’t left a message and no one was available to speak to me so I drove there, my heart pounding in my ears. I had run out of time to visit her that day and then I saw I’d missed a call from the residential home she lived in. On the morning of Tuesday 28 September, I loaded my guitar and a chilly bin into the car for a couple of nights away with friends at a remote Hawke’s Bay beach. Her daughter Mary-anne Scott writes about their farewells, synchronicity, and life in a big family of books. Celebrated children’s writer Joy Watson died on October 4, aged 83.
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