Christine Cuneo

Christine was born in a neat tidy suburb of Sydney, Australia, where she shared a home with her Mum and Dad, older brother, nana, a series of stray dogs and cats and a budgie called Pretty Boy. Being a tomboy from the start, Christine spent her early years playing football, forts and swinging from Gum trees in which she and her friends had created various hideouts. It was a kid's world where imagination reigned supreme and many happy hours were spent tunnelling through the long grass of the paddocks at the back of the garden, thoughts of snakes and other nasties blissfully ignored!

These days those glorious paddocks and trees are just happy memories, replaced long ago by acres of houses and roads. Christine went on to complete her HSC at a local Sydney High School where her love of English, languages and dramatics caused her teacher to suggest applying for NIDA (The National Institute of Dramatic Art). She was accepted at the young age of 17 and graduated with a Diploma of Acting in 1975. There followed various acting roles in TV and Theatre until it was time to start a family.

With two little children to look after, Christine took up many part-time jobs to help with the family finances; merchandising, creating desserts for a friend's restaurant and teaching drama at night college to name a few. During this time her favourite escape was always books and reading. And it was during these years that she started to experiment with writing. In 1995 Christine decided it was time to return to studies and chose the fascinating world of plants.

After graduating in Horticulture she turned to her other deep interest - the Mysteries of Ancient Egypt and the old world religions - spending hours in the Adyar Library in Sydney reading up on the occult.

Christine now has her own nursery in the beautiful Blue Mountains of NSW Australia, where she lives on the edge of the National Park with her husband Piercarlo and cat, Yuki. 'Living here in these glorious mountains makes me feel I have come home.'