Meg Mason is a New Zealand-born author and journalist. Her 2020 novel Sorrow and Bliss won the British Book Awards 2022 Fiction Book of the Year. Her latest novel, published in 2026, is Sophie, Standing There.
Early life and education Meg Mason grew up in a religious sect in Foxton, New Zealand. She later moved to Palmerston North, and then to Sydney, Australia, at the age of 16.
Career Mason lived in the United Kingdom for five years, during which time she wrote for the Financial Times and The Times, before moving back to Sydney and starting a career as a freelance journalist. She has written for a number of magazines, including Vogue, Elle, and GQ.
She published her first book Say It Again in a Nice Voice in 2012 and her first novel You Be Mother in 2017.
Sorrow and Bliss is Mason's third book and the first to be released in the UK. It won the British Book Awards 2022 Fiction Book of the Year. It was also shortlisted for the Australian Book Industry Awards Fiction Book of the Year in 2021 and the Women's Prize for Fiction in 2022, and was nominated for the Ockham Award. It was given the "incredibly pejorative" label of "sad girl fiction", which has been rejected by Mason. Amber Gwynne, who lectures in writing at the University of Queensland, called the story about a woman in the throes of a marriage breakdown "undeniably dark but famously funny". Film and television rights for Sorrow and Bliss were sold to New Regency.
In 2026 her new novel, Sophie, Standing There, the protagonist, who works for a literary festival becomes obsessed with a well-known writer. Mason created the "naturally cheerful" character of Sophie as a reaction to the labelling of her previous novel as sad girl fiction.
Personal life Mason was living in Sydney with her husband and two daughters.
Bibliography Year TitlePublisherISBNNotes2012Say It Again in a Nice VoiceHarperCollinsMemoir2017You Be MotherFourth EstateNovel2020Sorrow and BlissFourth EstateNovel. Winner of the British Book Awards Fiction Book of the Year in 2022. Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction in 2022. Shortlisted for the Australian Book Industry Awards Fiction Book of the Year in 2021.2026Sophie, Standing ThereFourth EstateNovel
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