Maria is the author of six internationally published travel books and four books for children. Together with Dag she wrote Visions of the Wild, the account of their kayak circumnavigation of Vancouver Island, which was published by Harbour Books in 2001.

Other titles include:
A Lambing Season In Ireland (McArthur and Co, 2000) and Fragile Edge (The Mountaineers Books, 2000), Sailing Back In Time (Whitecap, 1996), Three Moons in Vietnam(Abacus 1996), A Boat In Our Baggage (Abacus, 1994), and her children's books A Cat in a Kayak, A Seal in the Family, A Cat Adrift and Jungle Islands (all by Annick Press). Her work has also appeared in numerous newspapers and magazines.