Isobelle Carmody

BIO

Isobelle Carmody was born in 1958 in Victoria and grew up looking after her seven brothers and sisters, whom she kept in line by telling horror stories. She began writing the first book of The Obernewtyn Chronicles when she was just fourteen years old, and then went on to complete a Bachelor of Arts degree and a journalism cadetship. That first book was accepted by the first publisher she sent it to.

Obernewtyn was shortlisted for the 1988 Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award and since then her profile has grown dramatically. With a host of other award-winning novels to her credit, Scatterlings won Talking Book of the year in 1992 and in 1993 The Gathering was a joint winner of CBC Book of the Year Award and winner of the 1994 Children’s Literature Peace Prize. Billy Thunder and the Night Gate was shortlisted for the Patricia Wrightson Prize for Childrens Literature in the 2001 NSW Premiers Literary Awards. Greylands was named a White Raven at Bologna Book Fair and the title story of the Green Monkey Dream collection won Best Short Story in the Aurealis Awards when it was published. Darksong won an Aurealis Award in its year. Alyzon Whitestarr won a Golden Aurealis when it was published. The Red Wind was the winner of the 2011 CBCA award for younger readers; Night School short-listed in the Aureaulis awards, and The Stone Key short-listed 2011 Yabba Award.

The Legend of Little Fur was Isobelle’s first series for younger readers. She illustrated this and the other three books that completed this series herself with pen and ink drawings. She also illustrated The Red Wind, and edited a collection with Nan McNab, the first book of which was The Wilful Eye, launched 2011. Isobelle completed the next book in the Obernewtyn series, The Sending, released October 2011. The final book in the series, The Red Queen, was released in 2015.

Isobelle is one of Australia’s most highly regarded and prominent authors of fantasy for children and young adult readers. She was awarded the Nance Donkin Award given biennially by the Society of Women Writers Victoria to an outstanding Australian childrens author. Isobelle divides her time between Prague in the Czech Republic and her home on the Great Ocean Road in Australia and travels extensively as her books are published in several countries.

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