A phenomenal worldwide bestseller since 1977 THE THORN BIRDS is a robust, romantic saga of three generations. It begins in the early years of this century when Paddy Cleary moves his wife and seven children to Drogheda, an Australian sheep station, owned by his autocratic and childless older sister. For more than half a century we follow their fates, particularly those of Meggie, the only Cleary daughter, and the one man she truly loves, Ralph de Bricassart - stunningly handsome, ambitious, and a priest. As background to the Cleary family's lives there is the land itself: relentless in its demands, brilliant in its flowering.

THE THORN BIRDS is a book that enfolds the reader in its capacious arms.

The story begins in 1915 when Paddy Cleary moves his wife and seven children to an Australian sheep station. It ends after World War II when the only survivor of the third generation sets a course of life and love halfway round the world from her roots.

Colleen McCullough was born in Wellington, New South Wales, working in hospitals in Sydney and London before moving to the Yale University Medical School to train as a nurse. There she wrote the phenomenal bestseller THE THORN BIRDS.

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考琳·麦卡洛（Colleen McCullough, 1937- ），澳大利亚当代女作家。1977年，她以自己全部的生活积累，创作出版了呕心沥血之作《荆棘鸟》。作品一出版便引起轰动，不但拍成电影广为流传，而且翻译成二十多种文字在世界各地出版，成为当代世界最畅销的小说之一。

除《荆棘鸟》外，麦卡洛还创作十二部长篇小说，一部传记。她与丈夫居住在澳大利亚南太平洋的诺福克岛。