Geoffrey Mc Skimming

Geoffrey Mc Skimming

Geoffrey McSkimming (born 1 January 1962) is a children's novelist and poet. He is the author of the Cairo Jim chronicles and Jocelyn Osgood jaunts and the newly released Phyllis Wong series of mystery novels.

McSkimming was born on 1 January 1962 in Sydney, Australia. To write his Cairo Jim stories, he travelled to Egypt, Peru, Tanzania (including Zanzibar), Greece, Mexico, Turkey, Italy and Singapore and other locations. He is much in demand for author talks, and makes many appearances in character as his alter ego "Cairo Jim". More recently he has been appearing with magician Sue-Anne Webster to promote the Phyllis Wong series.

In addition to the Cairo Jim series and Ogre in a Toga, Geoffrey McSkimming has contributed to magazines and poetry anthologies and he has also narrated the Cairo Jim chronicles as audio books for Bolinda Publishing. He has written five character tours which take place regularly through the galleries at the Art Gallery of NSW in Sydney, Australia. His fifth character-based tour for the Art Gallery of NSW, featuring an alien named Pertinos from the planet BoomdiddyVostock, premiered in May 2011 in the contemporary galleries and the new Kaldor Contemporary Art Gallery there.

In June 2006 Geoffrey McSkimming undertook an author tour of the UK for Walker Books, who released ten titles in the Cairo Jim series in the UK. In 2007, Scholastic published Geoffrey McSkimming's book of verse, Ogre in a Toga and Other Perverse Verses. The audio version of this title, narrated by McSkimming, was shortlisted in the Audie Awards in 2008.

On 14 August 2008 Geoffrey McSkimming's performance work, "The Startling Tale of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark" (with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare), a monologue in verse, was performed by the author at the Abbotsleigh School for Girls' Literature Festival in Sydney, Australia.

Geoffrey McSkimming's 21st book, "Phyllis Wong and the Forgotten Secrets of Mr Okyto", was published in August 2012 in Australia by Allen & Unwin. He is currently writing the second story in the Phyllis Wong series, scheduled for publication in 2013.

Geoffrey McSkimming is represented by Curtis Brown Literary Agency, Sydney and London.

His Cairo Jim and Jocelyn Osgood books are published in many different languages in: