About the Author: Michael Robotham

Gold Dagger winning author, Michael Robotham was born in Australia in November 1960 and grew up in small country towns that had more dogs than people and more flies than dogs. He escaped in 1979 and became a cadet journalist on an afternoon newspaper in Sydney.

For the next fourteen years he worked for newspapers in Australia, Europe, Africa and America. As a senior feature writer for the UK’s Mail on Sunday he was among the first people to view the letters and diaries of Czar Nicholas II and his wife Empress Alexandra, unearthed in the Moscow State Archives in 1991. He also gained access to Stalin’s Hitler files, which had been missing for nearly fifty years until a cleaner stumbled upon a cardboard box that had been misplaced and misfiled.

In 1993 he quit journalism to become a ghostwriter, collaborating with politicians, pop stars, psychologists, adventurers and showbusiness personalities to write their autobiographies. Twelve of these non-fiction titles have been bestsellers with combined sales of more than 2 million copies.

His first novel 'THE SUSPECT', a psychological thriller, was chosen by the world’s largest consortium of book clubs as only the fifth “International Book of the Month”, making it the top recommendation to 28 million book club members in fifteen countries. It has been translated into twenty-two, including some he's barely heard of.

His second novel 'THE DROWNING MAN' (first published as 'LOST') won the Ned Kelly Award for the Crime Novel of the Year in 2005, given by the Australian Crime Writers Association. It was also shortlisted for the 2006 Barry Award for the BEST BRITISH NOVEL published in the US in 2005.

Michael's subsequent novels 'THE NIGHT FERRY' and 'SHATTER' were both shortlisted for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger in the UK in 2007 and 2008. 'SHATTER' went on to win the 2008 Ned Kelly Award for Australia's best crime novel and was also shortlisted in the inaugural ITV3 Thriller Awards and for South Africa's Boeke Prize. SAY YOU'RE SORRY was shortlisted for the 2013 Gold Dagger by the CWA judges and his stand-alone novel LIFE OR DEATH won the 2015 CWA Gold Dagger for best crime novel of the year.

His latest book CLOSE YOUR EYES will be published in 2015 and 2016.

Michael has recently swapped his 'pit of despair' (basement office) on Sydney’s northern beaches for a 'cabana of cruelty' where he funds the extravagant lifestyles of a wife and three daughters.