Michael Robotham biography

Michael Robotham Biography

Gold Dagger winning and Edgar short-listed 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 wrote for newspapers and magazines in Australia, Britain 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 show business personalities to write their autobiographies. Twelve of these non-fiction titles were bestsellers with combined sales of more than 2 million copies.

His partially completed first novel, a psychological thriller called The Suspect, caused a bidding war at the London Book Fair in 2002. Soon afterwards it 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.

Michael's novels have since been translated into 25 languages and have won or been shortlisted for numerous awards including:
The Crime Writer's Association Gold Dagger (won) Life or Death 2015 (shortlisted) Say You're Sorry 2013.
The Australian Book Industry Association ABIA General Fiction Award 2018 for The Secrets She Keeps
The Ned Kelly Award for Best Novel (won 2005 and 2008) Lost and Shatter.
The Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award for Best Novel (shortlisted) 2016 Life or Death
The Crime Writer's Association Steel Dagger (shortlisted) The Night Ferry and Shatter.

Michael lives on Sydney's northern beaches, where he thinks dark thoughts in his 'cabana of cruelty' - a name bestowed by his three daughters, who happily poke fun at the man who has fed, clothed and catered to their every expensive whim. Where is the justice?

Michael Robotham's website

This bio was last updated on 12/03/2021. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.