Karyn Hay ONZM is an award-winning novelist: her debut novel ""Emerald Budgies"" won the Hubert Church Best First Book Award in the New Zealand Book Awards in 2001. She was awarded a Frank Sargeson Fellowship in 2004.

""The March Of The Foxgloves"" published in 2016 was a No.1 bestseller on the New Zealand Fiction list. ""Winged Helmet, White Horse"" was published in 2018. That same year she was a writer in residence at the Michael King Centre.

Karyn is a mentor for the NZSA and a member of the Academy of New Zealand Literature and has worked as a radio copywriter, television front person, producer and director, radio announcer, newspaper columnist, and was the General Manager of radio station Kiwi FM. She has also been on numerous boards and was the inaugural Chair of Women In Film and Television, Auckland branch.