Nikki Gemmell

Nikki Gemmell (born 17 November 1966) is an Australian novelist and journalist. She is also a cultural commentator, and since 2026 the chief film critic for The Australian. She resides in Sydney, Australia.

Education

Gemmell was born in Wollongong, New South Wales, and attended Kincoppal-Rose Bay school, Sydney, on a scholarship. She graduated from the University of Technology Sydney with a master's degree in writing.

Career Journalism Gemmell began her career as a radio journalist for ABC Radio and the BBC World Service.

For 14 years, she wrote a weekly column for The Weekend Australian, which earned her the 2022 Walkley Award for commentary, analysis, opinion, and critique.

In January 2026, Gemmell concluded her tenure as a columnist to take on the role of chief film critic for The Australian.

Books Gemmell is the author of fourteen works of fiction and seven non-fiction books. The book went on to become a worldwide publishing sensation and the best-selling book by an Australian author in 2003. In 2022, it was named as one of the 25 best Australian novels of the past 25 years.

In 1999 Cleave was shortlisted in the Fiction category of the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards. Four books by Gemmell, Shiver, Cleave, The Bride Stripped Bare and The Book of Rapture, made the longlist of "Favourite Australian Novels" as chosen by readers of the Australian Book Review.

She has also published two series of books for children. One of these, The Kensington Reptilarium, was shortlisted for an Australian Book Industry Award in the category of Book of the Year for Older Children.

Gemmell's writing often utilises a second-person narrative, a style that has garnered both critical and popular acclaim. In 2007, the French literary magazine Lire included her in its list of the fifty most important writers in the world – those it believed would have a significant influence on the literature of the 21st century. In France she has also been described as a "female Jack Kerouac".

Screenwriting In 2025, Gemmell's debut novel, Shiver (1997), was greenlit for a major feature film adaptation. Co-written by Gemmell and director Robert Connolly, the screenplay is a contemporary retelling of her semi-autobiographical account of a journalist on an Antarctic expedition.