Cath Crowley is a Melbourne-based author and part-time teacher. She studied professional writing and editing at RMIT.
In 2010, already the author of the Gracie Faltrain trilogy (2004-2008) and the standalone Chasing Charlie Duskin, Crowley published Graffiti Moon, twenty-four hours in the lives of four teenagers. The novel won the Ethel Turner Prize (NSW Premier's Literary Awards) and the Prime Minister's Literary Award (young adult), and was made a Children's Book Council honour book; it was shortlisted for the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards, the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards, the ABIA Australian Book of the Year (older children), and Inky Award, and a KOALA Award. To date (2017), it has been published in England and the US, as well as Australia, and translated into seven other languages. Crowley's previous books had been successful and Chasing Charlie Duskin was translated into German, but Graffiti Moon triggered an entirely different level of visibility and success.
Crowley followed Graffiti Moon with Words in Deep Blue, in 2016. It won the Indie Award (young adult), Inky Award, and the Queensland Literary Award (young adult), and was a Children's Book Council of Australia honour book. It has also been shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards (announced November 2017). As of 2017, it has already been translated into Dutch.
In 2017, Crowley collaborated with fellow young-adult novelists Simmone Howell and Fiona Wood, each writing a protagonist of the novel Take Three Girls.