Gillian Mears
Born(1964-07-21)21 July 1964
Lismore, New South Wales, Australia
Died16 May 2016(2016-05-16) (aged 51)
Near Grafton, New South Wales, Australia
OccupationWriter
LanguageEnglish
NationalityAustralian

Gillian Mears (21 July 1964 – 16 May 2016) was an Australian short story writer and novelist. Her books Ride a Cock Horse and The Grass Sister won a Commonwealth Writers' Prize, shortlist, in 1989 and 1996, respectively. The Mint Lawn won The Australian/Vogel Award.[1] In 2003, A Map of the Gardens won the Steele Rudd Award.[2]

Life

Mears was born at Lismore Base Hospital, and raised in Grafton, New South Wales where she was school dux of Grafton High School.[3]

She moved to Sydney to study at university, beginning a degree in archaeology at the University of Sydney having been inspired to pursue a career in archaeology after reading Gods, Graves and Scholars by C. W. Ceram. At the age of 18, she withdrew from the course, and instead completed a degree in communications at University of Technology, Sydney.[3]

She lived near Grafton, New South Wales. She died in May 2016 after living with multiple sclerosis for seventeen years.[4]

Bernadette Brennan has written a biography of Gillian Mears.[5]

Awards and honours

Works

Novels

  • The Mint Lawn, Allen & Unwin, 1991, ISBN 978-1-86373-016-7
  • The Grass Sister, Alfred A. Knopf, 1995, ISBN 978-0-09-183121-9
  • Foal's Bread, Allen & Unwin, 2011, ISBN 978-1-74237-629-5

Short stories

  • Ride a Cock Horse Pascoe Publishing, 1988, ISBN 978-0-947087-12-8
  • Fineflour. University of Queensland Press. 1990. ISBN 978-0-7022-2311-2.
  • Collected stories, University of Queensland Press, 1997, ISBN 978-0-7022-2950-3
  • A map of the gardens: stories, Pan Macmillan Australia, 2002, ISBN 978-0-330-36346-4[9]

Non-fiction

  • Paradise is a place, Photographer Sandy Edwards, Random House Australia, 1997, ISBN 978-0-09-183641-2

Essays

Children's book

  • The Cat with the Coloured Tail, Walker Books, 2015, ISBN 9781922077400 (illustrated by Dinale Dabarera)

References

  1. ↑ The Prime of Ms Mears, archived from the original on 4 March 2016
  2. ↑ "Alive in Ant and Bee by Gillian Mears". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. February 2009. Archived from the original on 12 November 2012.
  3. 1 2 Purcell, John. "Gillian Mears, author of Foal's Bread, answers Ten Terrifying Questions". Booktopia. Retrieved 21 May 2016.
  4. ↑ Steger, Jason (19 May 2016). "Gillian Mears: Prize-winning author and euthanasia advocate dies". The Sydney Morning Herald. Fairfax Media. Archived from the original on 21 May 2016.
  5. ↑ Bernadette Brennan (September 2021). "Leaping into Waterfalls". Allen & Unwin. Retrieved 10 October 2021.
  6. ↑ Allen and Unwin, Foal's Bread
  7. ↑ ALS Gold Medal: Previous award winners, Association for the Study of Australian Literature, 2014, archived from the original on 11 December 2014
  8. ↑ Romei, Stephen (23 July 2012). "Mears wins PM's literary award for Foal's Bread". The Australian. News Limited.
  9. ↑ Bond, Sue (October 2002), A Map of the Gardens, archived from the original on 30 September 2012

Further reading

  • Hawley, Janet (7 May 2002). "Runaway success". The Sydney Morning Herald. Fairfax Media. Archived from the original on 13 November 2015.
  • Brennan, Bernadette. "Romance and reality" (PDF). Openbook. State Library of NSW. pp. 52–55. Retrieved 16 May 2022.


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