Gabrielle Carey obituary

Gabrielle Carey was an Australian author best known for co-writing the teen novel Puberty Blues with Kathy Lette.

This was Australia’s first teenage novel written by teenagers and published.

Because of its candid depictions of adolescent life in suburban southern Sydney at the time, the book sparked controversy.

The novel was adapted into a film in 1981, and a television series debuted in 2012.

When Carey was 12, she met Kathy Lette and they became best friends.

Both dropped out of school early, against the wishes of their families, and shared a flat where they wrote Puberty Blues.

Carey had recently emerged as a leading authority on the author James Joyce, as well as the organizer of Bloomsday celebrations of Joyce’s classic work, Ulysses.

Carey was born in Sydney and was a regular contributor to The Australian, among other publications.

She also recently wrote about the suicide of her father, Alex Carey.

Her second memoir, Waiting Room, is about her mother, Joan, who died of cancer in 2009.

Carey’s family memoir, Moving Among Strangers, was a co-winner of the 2014 Prime Minister’s Literary Award for non-fiction.

Her 2020 book, Only Happiness Here, was nominated for the prestigious 2021 Nib Literary Award.

Prioe to her sudden death, she was a senior lecturer in the University of Technology Sydney’s Creative Writing program, where she studied James Joyce and Randolph Stow.

Carey was born on 10 January 1959 and died 3 May 2023. She was 64 years.

She is survived by her two children, daughter Bridgette and son Jimmy.