In 2001 she moved back to New Zealand to join the MA in Creative Writing programme at the International Institute of Modern Letters, Victoria University of Wellington, where she was taught by Bill Manhire. Morris began taking fiction-writing classes at the West Side Y in 1997, and started making her living from writing two years later, freelancing as a copywriter and promotions manager for The New York Times, writing encyclopaedia entries for Contemporary Black Biography, and also working as a freelance branding consultant.

During her four years at BMG Classics she rose to become Label Director of ECM and eventually Vice-President of Marketing for World Music and Jazz. In 1994, Morris moved to New York to become Product Manager for the German record label ECM, then distributed by BMG. After completing a DPhil at the University of York, under the supervision of Hermione Lee, and after a brief stint living in Manchester, she moved to London, working for BBC Radio 3 as a production assistant, Virgin Records as Press Officer for Virgin Classics, and PolyGram (now Universal) as Press and Promotions Manager for Philips. She graduated from the University of Auckland in 1985 with a BA in English and history, and moved to the United Kingdom the same year. Her father is a New Zealander and her mother is English the family's tribal affiliations are Ngāti Wai, Ngāti Manuhiri and Ngāti Whātua. Morris was born and raised in Auckland, New Zealand. She is an associate professor at the University of Auckland and founder of the Academy of New Zealand Literature. Paula Jane Kiri Morris MNZM (born 18 August 1965) is a New Zealand novelist, short-story writer editor and literary academic. Magnolias and rattlesnakes: the southern lady in American fiction (1989)

The Eternal City by Paula Morris