Although he now lives in Melbourne, he maintains strong ties to the region, and set his first novel in Otago. The fictional town of Riverstone in both The Nancys and Nancy Businesswas modelled "somewhat on Balclutha", he said.
McDonald identifies as queer and co-parents two daughters.[2][5]
McDonald credits his tutors and mentors for "talking him off the ledge" halfway through writing The Nancys and "sticking with it" when he was going to pull out of the course and writing due to outside pressures.[6][7]
In 2019, his debut novel, The Nancys, was published in Australia and New Zealand by Allen and Unwin.[11][12][13][14]
McDonald's second novel in The Nancys series, Nancy Business, was published in June 2021.[15]
McDonald was a contributor to the 2022 crime fiction anthology, Dark Deeds Down Under: A Crime & Thriller Anthology with Nancys Undercover, a short story set one year after The Nancys[16]
R.W.R McDonald was a judge in the 2022 VPLA Unpublished Awards.[17]
In September 2023, McDonald’s first picture book, Happy Millionth Birthday, illustrated by Alexandra Colombo, published by Larrikin House[18]
The Nancys
The novel centres around an eleven year old school girl, Tippy Chan and her babysitting Uncle Pike and his boyfriend Devon, who together form a secret amateur detective club "The Nancys" to try and solve Tippy's teacher's murder in her small town over one summer.[3][19][20][1][21]
Nancy Business
The sequel to The Nancys. McDonald's second book takes place four months after The Nancys finished. The story begins on the one-year anniversary of Weifang (Joe) Chan's death. The amateur detective trio, made up of Tippy Chan, her Uncle Pike and his boyfriend, Devon, reform after a large explosion rocks Tippy's small hometown of Riverstone, South Otago. The Nancys believe the police have charged the wrong person with the bombing.[22][23][24]
