Heather Morris

Heather Morris is a New Zealand author best known for her debut novel, The Tattooist of Auschwitz (2018). In May 2024, Synchronicity Films, Sky Originals, and Peacock will release the TV miniseries with the same name.

Heather Morris was born in 1953 in Te Awamutu. She spent her childhood in the small village of Pirongia, with four generations of her family living nearby. Heather attended the local primary school and later Te Awamutu College. Although her academic performance was average, she excelled in athletics, swimming, netball, and tennis. Heather developed an early passion for storytelling, often immersing herself in the Encyclopaedia Britannica to explore distant lands.

Heather moved to Melbourne, Australia, where she met her future husband, Steve Morris. They married in 1973 and returned to New Zealand in 1975, settling in Christchurch. They had three children: their first son in 1976, a second son in 1980, and a daughter in 1985.

Heather pursued higher education later in life, beginning a Bachelor of Arts degree at Canterbury University in 1986. In 1987, the family moved back to Melbourne, and she completed her degree at Monash University in 1991, majoring in Political Science and Sociology. In 1995, Heather started working in the Social Work department at Melbourne's Monash Medical Centre, where she stayed until 2017.

Heather enrolled in the Professional Scriptwriting program at the Australian College of Journalism in 1996, following her passion for storytelling. She attended numerous screenwriting courses and workshops in Australia and the United States.

Heather's life changed on 3 December 2003 when she met Lale Sokolov. Over the next three years, Lale shared his experiences as the tattooist of Auschwitz, leading Heather to write his story initially as a screenplay. After Lale died in 2006, Heather struggled to get the screenplay produced. In 2017, she took her sister-in-law's advice and adapted the script into a novel.

The Tattooist of Auschwitz was published by Echo Publishing and Bonnier Books in 2018. The book became a bestseller, published in over 50 countries. Heather followed it with Cilka's Journey in 2019, which tells the story of Cilka, a character from her first book. In 2020, she published Stories of Hope, a non-fiction book. Her third Holocaust novel, Three Sisters, was released in 2021.

Heather's latest novel, Sisters under the Rising Sun, published in 2023, is set in Japanese POW camps in Indonesia during World War II. The book delves into the lives of women imprisoned in these camps and their struggles for survival.

Heather Morris currently resides in Australia.

Photo credit: heathermorrisauthor.com