Elizabeth Jolley was born in the industrial Midlands of England in 1923, and moved to Western Australia in 1959 with her husband and three children. Acclaimed as one of Australia’s leading writers, she has received many prestigious literary awards, an AO, honorary doctorates from WAIL (now Curtin University) and Macquarie University, and the ALS Gold Medal for her contribution to Australian literature. She has worked in a variety of occupations, and taught creative writing part time for a number of years at Curtin University of Technology. Elizabeth Jolley has published three collections of short fiction, a collection of essays (Central Mischief), thirteen novels and a novella (The Orchard Thieves). Mr Scobie’s Riddle and My Father’s Moon won the Age Book of the Year Award, The Georges’ Wife the National Book Council Banjo Award for fiction, Cabin Fever the FAW ANA Literature Award, and The Sugar Mother the France-Australia Literary Translation Award. She was awarded the Centenary of Federation Medal in 2003.
