Michael Gerard Bauer was born in Brisbane. After surviving school, he attended the University of Queensland where he enjoyed the social life while making brief and half hearted appearances in a variety of courses.

These included Commercial / Law and Social Work where he quickly discovered he was neither lawyer nor social worker material. Finally, like everyone else who didnt have a clue what they were, he enrolled in Arts.

After completing his Arts degree with a triple major in English Literature, Michael enrolled in a Diploma of Education, abandoned his fantasy of becoming the next Bob Dylan and became a teacher instead.

For a number of years Michael taught English and Economics at secondary schools in the Brisbane-Ipswich area but now he devotes himself to full-time writing, school visits and Festival appearances (although he still does a pretty mean impression of Bob Dylan on guitar).

In 2003 he won the inaugural Writesmall short story competition at the Brisbane Writers Festival. In 2004 his first novel for young adults The Running Man was published by Omnibus / Scholastic.

His second novel, DONT CALL ME ISHMAEL! was published by Omnibus / Scholastic in April 2006. It is a comedy set in an all boys school. The sequel, ISHMAEL AND THE RETURN OF THE DUGONGS was published in October 2007.

Michael’s latest book Dinosaur Knights (Scholastic, April 2009) is a sci-fi adventure novel suitable for upper primary and lower secondary readers. It tells the story of a giant flesh eating dinosaur which lost in the Middle Ages following a failed scientific experiment. Dinosaur Knights is an exciting fantasy adventure that will ‘set the blood racing, the heart pounding and the chain mail rattling’.

Today Michael lives with his family near the beautiful Brisbane suburb of Ashgrove - the setting for THE RUNNING MAN. It is the suburb in which he grew up, where he went to school, where he spent several years teaching, where he m