Christos Tsiolkas is an Australian author, playwright, essayist, and screenwriter of Greek origin. He was born and raised in Melbourne to Greek immigrant parents. Two of his novels, Loaded (1995) and Dead Europe (2005), were made into films. His fourth novel, The Slap, became an international bestseller and a television hit, and been turned into both an Australian and U.S. television mini-series. The book was longlisted for the 2010 Man Booker Prize and won the Australian Literary Society Gold Medal. In 2009 it won the Australian Booksellers Association and the Australian Book Industry Awards for Book of the Year. The book also won the Commonwealth Writers Prize 2009 for best novel in the South-East Asia and South Pacific area. Tsiolkas is known as openly gay and lives in Melbourne.
(Photo: John Tsiavis)
