About Me

Rachel Lees is the author of the popular New Zealand children's book, 'A Day on Grandad's Boat,' and the online memoir Sacred Grooming which is excerpts from her experience working for a cult leader.

Born in Blenheim, Marlborough, of New Zealand's South Island, Rachel had an idyllic childhood surrounded by her extended family in a small, close-knit town before moving to Auckland city with her family in her teenage years. She pursued her life-long passion for writing as a copywriter at a national radio station and studied writing for public relations in the USA before she was hand-selected by a christian fundamentalist cult leader to assist him with his correspondence and writing. Changing the course of her life, it has taken her many years to de-construct and process this experience, eventually writing a short memoir of this experience on a website dedicated to the survivors of this cult, which eventually led to the downfall of the organisation and resignation of the leader, as featured in the record-breaking 2023 Amazon documentary, Shiny, Happy People.

Rachel is returning to her love of writing with a children's adventure series due out in 2024; a sequel to A Day on Grandad's Boat, followed by a food memoir from Marlborough.

What Kind of Writer Am I?

I feel very lucky to have been born a New Zealander. Growing up in Marlborough with family holidays in the Marlborough Sounds or camping at Kaiteriteri every summer is a privilege that I am fully aware of and relish. The wonderful freedom that the 1970s and 1980s gave to the children of my generation nurtured creativity and security and rich experiences.

I love to write about the classic kiwi childhood and invoke the atmosphere of care-free days, whether it is messing about in boats on the sea, time with grandparents, family pets, the experiences of our great outdoors that was quite literally our backyard, is a joy to write about and recall and I believe is one of the reasons why my book A Day on Grandad's Boat is so popular. It brings back the innocence and happiness of those days to so many families doing so many simple, little, joyous things with those they love.

What Influenced Me

When I was thirteen years old, my literature-loving, poetry-obsessed grandmother gave me her own copy of Uncle Tom's Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Her parents, my great-grandparents had given it to her in 1927 for a Christmas present when she was 12 years old. This book changed the way I viewed the world. It knocked the rose-coloured glasses off my nose a little bit. It was as if I'd lived life up until this point in a fairy-tale full of happiness and light and sunshine and flowers and good people. Uncle Tom's Cabin showed me that humanity had this ability to be both cruel and kind, that there was this fight between good and evil in the world. This eventually led me to become so passionate about social justice that I pursued a Bachelor of Social Science degree at Waikato University.

Reading Made Me Love Writing

I have loved reading and writing since as early as I can remember. I grew up on a diet of Enid Blyton, Dr Seuss and Nancy Drew's and read just about anything I could get my hands on. Charlotte's Web was the first book I cried over.

From Jane Eyre to Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, to Wuthering Heights and Charles Dickens, Thackery and LM Montgomery, books such as these took me into a world where I could escape and live other lives and more importantly, led me to create my own. I have been writing since I was 8 years old, always taking a pen and notebook with me and writing out stories on long car journeys or under the covers of my bed with a flashlight.

The Grooming - my memoir

Before the Cult

1 Year Later

Excerpt from my memoir:

"At first she didn’t know it was such a privilege to be asked to sit at his table. He was just being nice and hospitable and acknowledging her as his newly-appointed correspondence secretary. He told her where to sit which was opposite his place at the table. He was talking animatedly with the others around them. It was late afternoon and all the staff were there, sitting down to a feast before Saturday night staff meeting. He was talking about what they’d been doing that week and everyone was giving him their full attention.

It was while he was talking that she first felt something brush up against her ankle. She didn’t move for a minute. Someone’s foot had accidentally bumped into hers. She tucked her legs around the legs of the chair.

Then she felt it again, a foot rubbing against hers, like a snake feeling its way along in the dark."