Colleen McCullough has died at age 77.

Internationally acclaimed Australian author Colleen McCullough has died in hospital on Norfolk Island, aged 77.

The popular writer was most well known for her sweeping family drama, The Thorn Birds, set on a remote sheep station in outback Australia.

The book, which sold 30 million copies worldwide, was sold for a then-record $1.9 million and a miniseries, starring Richard Chamberlain, Rachel Ward and Barbara Stanwyck became one of the most watched of all time.

But The Thorn Birds was just one of the many books McCullough wrote in a career spanning four decades.

Her first novel, Tim, written in 1974, tells the story of the relationship between an older woman and a younger, developmentally impaired man.

It too was dramatised and became one of actor Mel Gibson’s first films.

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McCullough continued to write in several genres, producing books including An Indecent Obsession, Morgan’s Run and The Ladies of Missalonghi.

But it was her seven-book, intensely researched, historical series Masters of Rome that won her much acclaim, including plaudits from politicians including Bob Carr, Henry Kissinger and Newt Gingrich.

Her final book Bittersweet was published in 2013 and she had been working on a sequel when she died.

Early life spent studying science, medicine

Born in Wellington, New South Wales, McCullough spent most of her childhood in Sydney.

Her mother Laurie was a New Zealander of Maori ancestry and her father Jim was an Irish immigrant who worked as a cane cutter and spent long periods away from the family.

She taught herself to read by the time she was three.

Speaking on Radio National’s book show a few years ago, McCullough spoke of how she started writing, buying a typewriter with money given to her by her mother for a much-needed overcoat.

“So I went to town with the five pounds to buy an overcoat, and I saw a Blue Bird portable typewriter for five pounds so I bought that instead,” she said

McCullough studied at Holy Cross College Woollahra, excelling in science and the humanities, before studying medicine for a time at the University of Sydney.

An allergy to surgical soap put an end to a career as a doctor.

She worked as a neuroscientist at Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney, before taking on a researcher role at Yale Medical School where she worked for 10 years.

It was at Yale that she began to write and also where she wrote Tim.