MAURI is the story of a man, Rewi, who reclaims his spirituality.

Rewi is haunted by a past which threatens to engulf his future. However his relationships with two women set him on the road to redemption. The elder, Kara, he loves as earth mother and spiritual healer. The younger, Ramari, is a beautiful headstrong woman with whom Rewi shares a volatile sexual attraction and deep painful love which ends in deprivation and rejection.

The story is set among the colourful characters of a once thriving settlement, Te Mata, upon whom the encroachment by Europeans spells disaster. Now isolated by lack of numbers, time and distance, the remaining survivors form a tight-knit community which outsiders find impenetrable. Rewi’s deceit forces him to become part of that community and his life is inextricably interwoven with those around him. Kara, the elder and acknowledged leader of Te Mata feels the unease in Rewi’s psyche and senses the emotional and spiritual damage he suffers. But like all spiritual healers she wisely waits his time to unburden himself even though her time is running out.

Throughout it all a little girl, Awatea, watches and wonders. An old man, Hemi, occasionally mediates and waits. Willie’s season comes and goes, while the two European men, Mr Semmens, and his son Steve who marries Ramari, hover at the parameters of insanity and sometime acceptance. MAURI starts with birth, ends with death, and is about life.