Introduction
Nicholas Francis Ward "Nick" Earls (born 8 October 1963 in Newtownards, Northern Ireland) is an award-winning novelist from Brisbane, Australia. He writes humorous popular fiction about everyday life, and is often compared to Nick Hornby. The majority of Earls' novels are set in his home town of Brisbane, a fact which led to his high local profile, and his fronting of a major Brisbane tourism campaign.
Biography
Earls emigrated to Australia from Northern Ireland at the age of nine in 1972 with his parents and sister. He was educated at the Anglican Church Grammar School while living in Brisbane. He completed a medical degree at the University of Queensland, and worked as a GP before turning to writing.
Career
Zigzag Street, his second novel, won the Betty Trask Award in 1998 (sharing with Kiran Desai's Hullaballoo in the Guava Orchard). His young-adult novel, 48 Shades of Brown, won the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award for older readers in 2000. Several of his novels (After January and 48 Shades of Brown) have been adapted for theatre, and 48 Shades of Brown was adapted into a film entitled 48 Shades, released in August 2006. Earls has also written other novels, including Bachelor Kisses (which borrows its title from a song by Brisbane band The Go-Betweens), Perfect Skin, World of Chickens, The Thompson Gunner, and young adult novels After January, and Making Laws for Clouds.
Earls has also contributed to the four best-selling anthologies in the Girls' Night In series as well as Kids' Night In and Kids' Night In 2 as editor. His most recent novels are Welcome to Normal, a collection of original short stories, The True Story of Butterfish, about a former rock star re-adjusting to mundane life in the Brisbane suburbs, and Monica Bloom, based on his own adolescent experience of an ill-fated crush.
Several of his books have been adapted for the stage by Brisbane's La Boite Theatre Company.
He is referenced in the film All My Friends Are Leaving Brisbane.