Gail Jones (writer)

Gail Jones is an Australian novelist and academic.

Early life and career
Gail Jones was born in Harvey, Western Australia. She grew up in Broome and Kalgoorlie. She studied fine arts briefly at the University of Melbourne before returning to Western Australia where she took her undergraduate degree and PhD from the University of Western Australia in 1994. Her thesis was titled Mimesis and alterity: postcolonialism, ethnography and the representation of racial 'others'. She is currently Professor of Writing in the Writing and Society Research School at the Western Sydney University.

Jones has also contributed content for an art exhibition, The floating world by Jo Darbyshire (2009).

Since 2017 Jones has been involved in a research project Other Worlds: Forms of 'World Literature', for which she is leading a theme titled 'Form as Encounter' that is exploring intercultural intersections and encounters.

Novels

 * Black Mirror (2002)
 * Sixty Lights (2004)
 * Dreams of Speaking (2006)
 * Sorry (2007)
 * Five Bells (2011)
 * A Guide to Berlin (2015)
 * The Death of Noah Glass (2018)
 * Our Shadows (2020)
 * Salonika Burning (2022)
 * One Another (2024)

Short story collections

 * The House of Breathing (1992)
 * Fetish Lives (1997)

Critical works

 * Dorothy Green Memorial Lecture Gail Jones, 'A Dreaming, a Sauntering: re-imagining critical paradigms' JASAL 5 (2006)
 * The Piano (Australian Screen Classics), Currency Press (2007)

These works have been widely translated. The languages include Italian, German, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, Hebrew, Mandarin, Polish, Croatian and Czech.

Awards
The House of Breathing
 * Western Australian Premier's Book Awards, Fiction winner 1993
 * FAW Barbara Ramsden Award Book of the Year, 1992
 * T. A. G. Hungerford Award for an unpublished work of Fiction by a Western Australian Writer, 1991
 * Steele Rudd Award 1993

Fetish Lives
 * Western Australian Premier's Book Awards, Fiction joint-winner and Premier's Prize joint-winner 1997

Black Mirror
 * Nita Kibble Literary Award, 2003
 * Western Australian Premier's Book Awards, Fiction winner 2002
 * Shortlisted Age Book of the Year Award 2003
 * Shortlisted Brisbane Courier Mail Book of the Year 2003
 * Longlist International Dublin Literary Award 2003

Sixty Lights
 * Western Australian Premier's Book Awards, Fiction winner and Premier's Prize 2004
 * South Australian Premier's Awards, winner, 2006
 * ALS Gold Medal, 2005
 * The Age Book of the Year Fiction Award, winner, 2005
 * Shortlist Miles Franklin Award 2005
 * Shortlist Commonwealth Writers Award Pacific Region 2005
 * Shortlist NSW Premier's Fiction Award 2005
 * Shortlist Victorian Premier's Fiction Award 2005
 * Longlist International Dublin Literary Award 2006
 * Longlist Booker Prize (2004)

Dreams of Speaking
 * Longlisted for Orange Prize (UK) 2006
 * Shortlisted for Queensland Premiers' Prize 2006
 * Shortlisted for Miles Franklin Award, 2007
 * Shortlisted for NSW Premier's Prize 2007
 * Shortlisted for Brisbane Courier Mail Book of the Year 2007
 * Shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award, 2008

Sorry
 * Shortlisted for Miles Franklin Award, 2008
 * Shortlisted for Prime Minister's Literary Awards, 2008
 * Shortlisted for Nita Kibble Award 2008
 * Shortlisted for SA Premiers Fiction Prize 2008
 * Shortlisted for Victorian Premier's Award 2008
 * Longlisted for Orange Prize (UK) 2008
 * Shortlisted for Prix Femina Etranger (France) 2008

Five Bells
 * Nita Kibble Literary Award, winner, 2012
 * People's Choice Award, NSW Premier's Literary Awards, winner, 2012
 * Longlisted for Miles Franklin Award, 2012

A Guide to Berlin
 * Colin Roderick Award, Winner, 2015
 * Shortlisted for NSW Premier's Literary Awards, 2015
 * Longlisted for the Stella Prize, 2016

The Death of Noah Glass Our Shadows
 * Shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Prize for Fiction, 2019
 * Longlisted for the ALS Gold Medal, 2019
 * Shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award, 2019
 * Prime Minister's Literary Awards, Fiction winner, 2019
 * Shortlisted for the Voss Literary Prize, 2019
 * Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature, 2020, Fiction Award

Salonika Burning
 * Shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Prize for Fiction, 2021
 * Longlisted for the Miles Franklin Award, 2021
 * Shortlisted for the Voss Literary Prize, 2021


 * ARA Historical Novel Prize (adult), winner, 2023

Personal life
Jones has a daughter, Kyra Giorgi, who is also a writer.