Author Bio

photo by David Southworth

Emma Michelle is a writer whose work has been published by places like Going Down Swinging, Kill Your Darlings, and Lonely Planet.

In 2020 her story “Metronomy” was shortlisted for the Apollo Bay WordFest Short Story Award. She won the inaugural Freedom to Write Freefall Scholarship in 2018, and her story “Like Siamese” was longlisted for the Birdcatcher Books Short Story Award in 2016.

In 2017 she self-published a collection of short stories and personal essays titled Watching Cartoons with Boys that explored the intersections between animation, pop culture, relationships, and identity. It received glowing reviews from Ramona Magazine and Underground Writers.

Outside of writing fiction, Emma is interested in academic research examining the work of J. D. Salinger (especially his depictions of grief and trauma). She got her Bachelor of Arts (Hons) from the ANU in 2012 and wrote a minor thesis examining Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye and “Seymour: An Introduction” as narratives of unresolved grief.

Emma is currently working on a major re-write of her first novel, titled Rare Birds.