ABOUT ASHLEY
In short…
Ashley Kalagian Blunt is a writer, speaker and podcaster. Her number one bestselling psychological thriller, Dark Mode, is out now in Australia/NZ, the UK, Germany and South Korea. It was shortlisted for the 2024 ABIA General Fiction Book of the Year, the Danger Awards Best Crime Debut, and the Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Fiction.
She is the author of two previous books, How to Be Australian, a memoir, and My Name Is Revenge, a thriller novella and collected essays. Her writing appears widely across Australian and international publications.
Ashley is a frequent speaker and panel moderator, and co-hosts a podcast on writing, creativity and health.
Her next thriller, Cold Truth, is out from Ultimo Press in February 2025.
A little more detail…
Ashley Kalagian Blunt is the number one bestselling author of Dark Mode, a psychological thriller. Dark Mode was shortlisted for the 2024 ABIA General Fiction Book of the Year, the Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Fiction, and the Danger Award for Debut Fiction. It was ranked number 20 in the Better Reading Top 100. Her previous books are How to Be Australian (2020), a memoir, and My Name Is Revenge (2019), a thriller novella and collected essays. My Name is Revenge was shortlisted for the 2019 Woollahra Digital Literary Awards and was a finalist in the 2018 Carmel Bird Digital Literary Award.
Her writing appears in Griffith Review, Sydney Review of Books, Overland, Australian Book Review, The Sydney Morning Herald, Marie Claire, Openbook, Kill Your Darlings, and more.
Ashley is an award-winning speaker and has appeared at Sydney Writers’ Festival, Brisbane Writers’ Festival, Story Club and more, and is a Moth StorySLAM winner. She is the co-host of James and Ashley Stay at Home, a podcast about writing, creativity and health, and was a judge in the 2020 Writing NSW Varuna Fellowship.
She also teaches a range of creative writing courses and mentors emerging writers. She has a decade of experience in teaching and curriculum design, working with children and adults, and has a Master of Research in creative writing.
Before moving to Australia, Ashley lived and worked in Canada, South Korea, Peru and Mexico.
In 2022, Ashley was an artist in residence at Bundanon, and on fellowship at KSP Writers' Centre. Her Armenian travel memoir was shortlisted for the 2018 Impress Prize for New Writers and the 2017 Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award, and received a 2015 Varuna PIP residency.