Emily Tsokos Purtill
Author of Literary Fiction
based in WA
Emily Tsokos Purtill is a WA writer and former lawyer of Greek heritage. Emily father’s family was from the island of Evia. Her mother’s family was from Kastellorizo and Rhodes.
Emily lives in Perth and has also lived in the UK, Vancouver, Paris and New York. After winning awards for her short stories as a young writer (including the Tim Winton Award and twice winning the Katharine Susannah Pritchard Award for Young Writers), Emily pursued a career in law and worked as a lawyer in Perth and in Paris.
Emily has short fiction in Westerly, Griffith Review and Science Write Now. She’s a 2024 winner of the Griffith Review Emerging Voices Competition for her essay, Know Thyself, which will be published in 2025.
Her debut matrilineal Greek-Australian multi-generational novel Matia (UWA Publishing) was released in October 2024.
“Through four different points of view, Tsokos Purtill excavates what it means to be a woman, particularly when traditional values and the social and cultural consequences of immigration trickle down through generations. Matia is an engrossing novel that looks at intergenerational trauma, secrets, guilt, tradition and superstition, for fans of The Eighth Life by Nino Haratischvili.”
—DANIELLE BAGNATO, Books + Publishing
