Irini Savvides grew up in Sydney in an extended Greek Cypriot family. She holds a Master of Arts from Macquarie University and a Master of Education from Sydney University, and has worked as an English and drama teacher.
Savvides has lived in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, and says that being a writer 'means hours and hours of solitary work, researching, planning, drafting, editing, thinking and playing with text until it is shaped into something that feels just right.' Her novels usually present 'small snippets of time woven together in different text types' as she believes that 'the complexity of the time frames shifting help to highlight the fact that each character is as influenced by their past as their present.'
Source: The Random House Reading Guide for Aliki Says, http://www.randomhouse.com.au/ Sighted 2009