Nikki Gemmell is the bestselling author of 13 novels and four works of non-fiction. Her books have been translated into 22 languages. She was born in Wollongong, New South Wales, and lived in London for many years, but has now returned to Australia. Her distinctive writing has gained her critical acclaim in France, where she's been described as a 'female Jack Kerouac'. The French literary magazine Lire included her in a list of the 50 most important writers in the world - those it believes will have a significant influence on the literature of the 21st century. Gemmell pens a weekly column for The Weekend Australian Magazine and she also writes novels for children. Four of her books - Shiver, Cleave, The Bride Stripped Bare and The Book of Rapture - made the longlist of Favourite Australian Novels as chosen by readers of Australian Book Review.

'Every woman on Earth should read it' Caroline Overington, Weekend Australian
Having lived through the humiliation and bewildering complexity of heartbreak in her twenties, Nikki Gemmell eventually resurfaced, reclaimed space for herself and found her voice. Decades later she has written a deeply personal, profoundly intimate reflection on love and female creativity, and what happens when the two collide in a man's world.
Dissolve is a conversation. A conversation with the young women of Gemmell's teenage daughter's generation, and of course with men.