Authors A-Z

Kate is a children’s author hailing from Scotland, but now living with her family in the New Forest. Her love of the written word stayed with her throughout a career in accountancy, until it was an itch she could no longer ignore. When she is not wrestling words into shape, you may find her strolling through the woodlands, tinkering at a spreadsheet, or hiding in a dark cinema.

A spoken word musician artist, Bee was a finalist in this year’s BBC Music Introducing Scottish Act of the Year. In 2019 Asha starred in the BBC Documentary, Spit it Out and in 2021 she cofounded award-winning charity, The Spit it Out Project.

A Scottish writer and broadcaster and host of the The Big Scottish Book Club on BBC iPlayer Damian also ran the Literary Salon for 25 years. He has just turned his memoir Maggie & Me into a theatre production. Damian’s other works include critically acclaimed debut novel You Will Be Safe Here.

Rob is a bestselling and multi award-winning author/illustrator of children’s books. His first picture book, Blown Away, was published in 2014 and was only the second illustrated book in history to win the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize. As well as working on his own books he also illustrates for other authors including Michael Bond (of Paddington fame), Jeff Brown (the Flat Stanley series), Philip Ardagh, Piers Torday, Jenny Pearson, Garth Jennings, Jess Butterworth, SE Durrant, Christian O'Connell and Barry Hutchison. Rob was the official World Book Day Illustrator for 2019, 2020 and 2021.

Susi is a listed author and storyteller with the Scottish Book Trust and the Scottish Storytelling Centre. She co-hosts the original story and sang show Oor Wee Podcast with Alan McClure. Susi’s work with Oor Wee Podcast and the Nip Nebs series of Books were all shortlisted for Scots Language Awards. All her original stories and poems are in Scots because she wants the next generation to see that the Scots language is as beautiful and valid as any other on this bonny birling planet. Susi is also a songwriter, poet and musician. She is the founder of Music Matters which provides interactive and intergenerational music sessions for people in care homes. Susi regularly facilitates workshops for people of all ages and abilities in music and writing. 

Creator of investigative journalist Jack Parlabane and winner of the 2020 Crime Writers’ Association Dagger in the Library award, Chris’ other works include Bedlam which he turned into a video-game. Under the pseudonym Ambrose Parry he collaborates with his wife, Marisa Haetzman, to produce historical crime novels the latest of which is Voices of the Dead.

James decided to be a writer when he was seven, once he realised that he could not be a duck. James travels around primary schools telling stories and encouraging children to write their own stuff. James started his career as a comedian on the comedy circuit and then moved into children’s shows, touring the world with his hugely successful Comedy 4 Kids, which is still the ONLY children's show ever to do Montreal's Just For Laughs! James is one of the UK’s favourite children’s performers, lives in an off-grid farm, finding inventive ways to reduce his environmental impact and is passionate about demystifying the importance of saving the planet for children. DON’T PANIC! WE CAN SAVE THE PLANET! is a spin-off to the award-winning and bestselling Funny Life Of series (including Sunday Times Children's Sports Book Prize winner, The Funny Life of Football in 2023).

Creator of internationally popular detectives Vera Stanhope, Jimmy Perez and Matthew Venn and with 37 international best-sellers Ann is a member of the crime fiction promoters ‘Murder Squad’ and founded the ‘Reading for Wellbeing’ project. In 2017 she was awarded the highest accolade in crime writing, the CWA Diamond Dagger and in 2022 received an OBE for her services to reading and libraries.

Joseph is a multi-award-winning poet, author, writer, performer and the UK Children’s Laureate 2022-2024. He has won countless awards and accolades across his best-selling picture books, chapter books and poetry anthologies, most recently the prestigious Yoto Carnegie Medal for Writing 2024. Joseph is one of the great performers of children’s literature, and inspires thousands of children the world. A tireless advocate for the arts and arts services, Joseph recently visited, and joined, all 213 libraries across the UK raising awareness of their work.

James is a writer and broadcaster. His first major book, Fallen Glory: The Lives and Deaths of History’s Greatest Buildings was shortlisted for the Saltire Literary Award for best non-fiction. His other books include Who Built Scotland: 25 Journeys in Search of a Nation, Scotland’s Landscapes and Aerofilms: A History of Britain from Above. His most recent book is The Edge of the Plain: How Borders Make and Break Our World. In 2019 he was named as the Archive and Records Association’s first-ever 'Explore Your Archives' Ambassador. He lives in Edinburgh.

Amelia is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, has commercial Class V with Command Endorsement qualification, Certificates for Saving Life & Sea, Fire Fighting & 1st Air, she was brought up in the Yorkshire Dales where she developed her passionate interest in wildlife and love of nature, she has travelled widely and now lives in central London.

Dharshini is an award-winning economist and broadcaster, currently the Chief Economics Correspondent for BBC News, as well as a presenter on BBC Radio 4, including for a recent series on ‘fast fashion’. She began her career as an economist in government and then as HSBC Investment Bank’s UK Economist, before going on to cover financial stories for the BBC and Panorama. She has also presented business and political programmes for Sky News, including their flagship Sky News Tonight. She is the author of The Almighty Dollar.

Best-known as the co-founder of pop group The KLF and its successor the K foundation with which he famously burned £1m, Bill is a Scottish artist, musician, writer and record producer. In 2023 he published with Jimmu Cauty 2023: A Trilogy and is currently working on a collection of spoken word novels.

The long-standing presenter of BBC Newsnight and current Chancellor of the University of Kent explores the British political system in peril in his latest book Britain is Better Than This. Analysing the structural and constitutional failures at the heart of the political system, the book also looks forward with hope, offering practical solutions to build a better future.

Simple Minds guitarist Derek’s autobiography A Very Simple Mind: On Tour tells the story of the band’s early days and how working-class lads from 1970s Glasgow took on the world. Derek also co-wrote many of the band’s earliest classics and is well known on the international stage as songwriter and bassist for Big Country and Propaganda. In 2010 he was voted best bass player from Scotland.

Fiona writes much loved romantic comedy novels celebrating the joy, drama and messiness of women’s lives. Originally from a tiny Yorkshire village called Goose Eye, she started her writing life at 17 on teen magazines Jackie and Just Seventeen. As editor of more! magazine she invented its infamous regular feature, Position of the Fortnight (it remains a career highlight). It was after having three children, and craving an outlet for the chaos of family life, that Fiona turned her hand to writing fiction. She has now written 20 novels, sold over 1.5 million books and lives with her husband Jimmy in Glasgow.

Neil is a Church of Scotland minister and has broadcast on radio and television, co-hosted a podcast for the Scottish Bible Society (The Outspoken Bible) and reached wide audiences with YouTube videos during the Covid pandemic. For four years he convened the Church of Scotland’s Ministries Council.

Rosemary worked for the publisher W&R Chambers before becoming literary editor of Scotland on Sunday. She was then literary editor and columnist for The Herald and Sunday Herald. The author of two historical novels, After Flodden and Dacre’s War, she is also the editor of the bestselling Scotland: The Autobiography and Scotland: Her Story – The Nation’s History by the Women Who Lived It. She lives in the heart of the Scottish Borders, where many of the events in Homecoming took place.

An author and researcher based on the west coast of Scotland Kat’s latest book Bothy – In Search of Simple Shelter reveals the history of these wild mountain shelters and the people who visit them. With an historian’s insight and a rambler’s imagination, Kat lends fresh consideration to the concepts of nature, wilderness and escape. Kat has lectured at Oxford, UEA and Birkbeck College and most recently held an Environmental Humanities fellowship at the Institute of Advanced Studies at the University of Edinburgh.

Genevieve is a queer writer and witch from Scotland. Deeply involved in the literary community, Genevieve is a co-editor for Witch Craft Magazine. Genevieve’s writing can be found across the web at such locations as, X-RAY Magazine, Expat Press, and Body Fluids Lit Mag. Additional to writing, Genevieve works as a tarot reader, dealing fortunes across Glasgow.

Former Scottish Makar Jackie received an MBE for services to literature in 2006 and an CBE in 2020. The daughter of a Scottish mother and Nigerian father who was adopted at birth, many of her poetry collections explore themes of adoption, identity and the power of language. She has been the Writer in Residence at the University of Salford since 2015.

Lorraine Kelly CBE is a Scottish television presenter, journalist and author, best known for her ITV show, Lorraine. In 2006 she won the RTS Award for best presenter and in 2008 was awarded a “people’s choice” Scottish BAFTA. Lorraine also writes weekly columns for Hello! Magazine, and was one of the longest serving columnists for The Sun. Her debut novel The Island Swimmer is inspired by her deep love for the Orkney Islands and its people.

Mairi is the author of the novel The Specimens (September 2024), and of We Are All Witches, Warriors and Witches and Damn Rebel Bitches and Feisty, Fiery and Fierce, all of which explore women in Scottish history and legend. In her day job she has been Head of Literature for Creative Scotland, CEO of Seven Stories the National Centre for Children's Books, and MD of award-winning publishing house Barrington Stoke. She is currently Director of The Saltire Society where she has the privilege of managing Scotland's National Book Awards among other projects. Mairi is a fluent Gaelic speaker with a First in Celtic Studies from Edinburgh University, and is a regular contributor on BBC Alba, BBC Radio nan Gàidheal and BBC Radio Scotland.

Liz is a Scottish playwright, translator and broadcaster. From 2011 to 2016 she was the Makar of Scotland and served as the Poet Laureate for Glasgow from 2005 to 2011. In 2015 Lochhead was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry. Her latest poetry collection A Handsel includes a wealth of new poems celebrating human relationships and also brings together all the poet’s collections.

International best-selling author Coinneach MacLeod, the Hebridean Baker was born and raised on the Isle of Lewis, the most northerly of the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. Inspired by traditional family recipes, Scottish flavours and the myths & legends of the Hebrides, his three cookbooks have made him Scotland’s best-selling cookbook author.

Rhoda was born and brought up on the Isle of Lewis and is a native Gaelic speaker. Following an Arts Degree from Glasgow, she worked in the media – firstly on screen as a programme presenter before moving to production where, of course, the real power lies. In the early 1990’s she headed up the nascent Gaelic TV production output for Scottish Television, producing a range of genres in the language, including a 72 episode language-teaching series that created upwards of 10,000 new Gaelic speakers. She later became Controller of Factual Programmes and was the Executive Producer of the Bafta Award-winning documentary, After Lockerbie. Rhoda then moved into politics and became a special advisor to the Secretary of State for Scotland before becoming any agency based communications consultant. She is currently Senior Counsel at H-advisors, Cicero.

As a musician, under the moniker of the Mull Historical Society, Isle of Mull-born Colin MacIntyre has 8 albums to his name and his first book, The Letters of Ivor Punch, won 2015’s Edinburgh International Book Festival First Book Award as well as the Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize.  He has been voted Scotland’s Top Creative Talent at the Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland Awards. WHEN THE NEEDLE DROPS is his first book set specifically on Mull.

Andrew is a prominent British journalist, broadcaster, and author, known for his insightful political commentary. Born on July 31st 1959 in Glasgow, Scotland, Marr began his career in journalism with The Scotsman before rising to prominence as the editor of The Independent. He later became a key figure at the BBC, hosting The Andrew Marr Show for many years. Marr is also a respected author, having written several books on history and politics.

Lynsey May is a writer, reader and café-lover based in Edinburgh. Her debut novel Weak Teeth is a blackly comic tale of family, infidelity, and extreme toothache. It has been praised by The Scotsman’s Allan Massie as “An agreeably light novel which is also a serious examination of human relationships”.

Kim is a freelance business journalist who has hosted seven series of Clever About Cash on BBC Radio Scotland, written features for The Herald and The Scotsman and contributed to a range of BBC Radio 4 programmes.

A prolific writer of well over 300 books ‘Sandy’ McCall Smith is arguably best known for his worldwide bestselling series The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency and 44 Scotland Street¸ as well as the Von Igelfeld series and the Corduroy Mansions novels. With four new books due for release in 2024, there will be plenty to talk about.

Hollie is a poet and author based between Glasgow and Cambridge. She was the first poet to record an album at Abbey Road Studios, London, and won the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry for her poetic parenting memoir – Nobody Told Me – of which The Scotsman stated ‘the world needs this book’. She has published four further collections of poetry – Papers, Cherry Pie, Plum and Slug, which was a Sunday Times Bestseller and translated into French under the title Je souhaite seulement que tu fasses quelque chose de toi. Her new book Lobster, and other things I’m learning to love shot straight into the Sunday Times Bestsellers once again and saw her sell out shows up and down the country including London's Hackney Empire.

Alistair is one of Scotland’s most respected popular historians. A former Director of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Director of Programmes at Scottish Television and founder of the Borders Book Festival, he is also the author of several highly acclaimed books. From 2011 he was Rector of the University of St Andrews. He has written more than thirty books on Scottish history, his latest is The Highlands and Islands of Scotland.

Judy Murray OBE is a former Scottish international tennis player and has 64 national titles to her name. Judy is a powerful voice in the battle for equality of opportunity for women in sport and was awarded an OBE for services to tennis, women in sport and charity. Judy was a Costa Book Awards judge in 2021. Her memoir Knowing the Score was a Sunday Times bestseller and nominated for Sports Book of the Year. The Wild Card is her first novel.

James Naughtie FRSE is a British radio and news presenter. Beginning his career with the Scottish press he went on to present Radio 4’s Today programme for over 20 years, is a presenter on the televised Proms and hosts the Radio 4 Bookclub. His fiction includes the Will Flemyng thriller series plus a range of non-fiction titles including On the Road: Adventures from Nixon to Trump.

Mike is an Edinburgh-based children’s author. He also works as a consultant as well as running events for all ages in nurseries, schools and at book festivals. As a writer he has written books for all ages of Primary School children. His most recent are the six books in the Museum Mystery Squad series for early readers (6-8 year olds). He’s currently script writing for CBeebies programme Tiny Wonders, and in the past has written stories for BBC Schools Radio.

Andrés is a queer Latinx writer based in Edinburgh. Drawing on his family’s immigrant history and third culture upbringing, his writing maps the journey of diaspora. He is the author of the poetry collection At Least This I Know and novel How We Named the Stars. In 2024 Andrés was selected as one of The Observer’s 10 Best Debut Novelists. He serves as a trustee and board member for Artlink Edinburgh.

Author of Mayflies which has been adapted into an award-winning BBC drama, Andrew is editor-at-large of the London Review of Books and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has been nominated for the Booker Prize three times and won the E. M. Forster Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His latest novel Caledonian Road is a story full of crimes, secrets and scandals.

Michael is a prize-winning Scottish poet and author, and the Writer in Residence at The University of Edinburgh. His prose debut, Boy Friends, was published to rave reviews and was a Sunday Times Critics Choice 2022. Michael has been shortlisted for the Forward Prizes for Poetry and The Saltire National Book Awards and won a Robert Louis Stevenson Fellowship. He co-founded and curated the iconic arts production house Neu! Reekie! for over ten years.

Len is a poet who writes predominantly in the Scots language. She writes passionately about the promotion of minoritised languages, survivors of domestic abuse and the destigmatisation of mental illness. She sprang into the public eye in 2020 for her Scots Word of the Day, but quickly developed a following for her fierce, feminist poetry. She now has more than 1.5 million followers across her channels. She’s developed a reputation for forthrightly dealing with the trolls she gets as a young woman, calling out the misogyny in her comments with a perfect blend of rage and humour. She’s also a survivor of abuse, and is passionate about using her platform to help others with similar experiences feel less alone.

Chitra is an award-winning journalist and author based in Edinburgh. Her first book Expecting: The Inner Life of Pregnancy won the Saltire First Book of the Year Award. Her new memoir/biography Homelands – The History of Friendship tells the story of her decade-long friendship with a Holocaust survivor Henry Wuga.

The international best-selling creator of John Rebus, Ian’s latest Rebus novel is due for release in October 2024. He is the recipient of four Crime Writers’ Association Dagger Awards, including the Diamond Dagger, the UK’s most prestigious award for crime fiction. Ian is the recipient of honorary degrees from universities across the UK, is a Fellow of The Royal Society of Edinburgh and a Fellow of The Royal Society of Literature and received a Knighthood for his services to literature and charities in 2022.

Frank lives with his family in the crofting village of South Galson in the Isle of Lewis. He is Professor of Sustainable Rural Development at the University of the Highlands and Islands and a Research Associate of the UHI Environmental Research Institute. A natural scientist by training and inclination, he has also been closely involved in the community and cultural development of this region for forty years. He is also the author of The Changing Outer Hebrides which won the Highland Book Prize in 2020.

Hugo Rifkind is a columnist, critic and leader writer for The Times and a presenter on Times Radio, having formerly been a columnist for the Spectator, GQ and the Herald. He is a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4’s comedy show The News Quiz. He was born and raised in Edinburgh, studied at Cambridge, and now lives in North London. His latest novel Rabbits has been described by Val McDermid as ‘Darkly funny as Saltburn, but with kilts’.

Jan has been working in the area of the arts and literature for more than 25 years, working with some of the largest publishing houses in the world (PRH, Hachette, Birlinn, BBC and more) and privileged to work with many of our leading writers and artists. She ran the professional development and mentoring programmes at Scottish Book trust for a decade and managed the Scottish Review of Books Magazine for 12 years. Jan is incredibly proud to be Publicity & Marketing Director at Birlinn Ltd (Scotland’s largest independent publisher) but maintains her full portfolio with her own business, Publicity and the Printed Word, working with the talented arts promoter and events co-ordinator, Anna Marshall. Jan and Anna managed the making and touring stages of The Great Tapestry of Scotland and Jan remains on the advisory board of its new permanent home in the Scottish Borders.

Sara is a Glasgow based writer of over 20 books including costy crime noir mysteries set in 1950’s Britain, and historical novels based on the real-life series of late Georgian and early Victorian explorers. She has also written non-fiction, as well as books for children. Sara has been named one of the most Saltire Society’s 365 most influential Scottish women, past and present.

Jen is a journalist, writer and radio producer from the Fairisle who has covered the war in Ukraine since March 2022. Her empathetic and vivid reporting on the human cost of war and her in-depth coverage of the deportations in Kharkiv region was shortlisted for an Amnesty media award in 2023. Her fluency in Russian and Ukrainian have allowed Jen to build relationships with those most affected by the ongoing conflict, and their stories are told in her debut book Night Train to Odesa – Covering the Human Cost of Russia’s War.

Malachy is one of the most exciting and critically acclaimed writers to emerge from Scotland in the past decade and was shortlisted for the Saltire First Book Award for 60 Degrees North. The Un-Discovered Islands was named Illustrated Book of the Year at the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards 2016 and The Valley at the Centre of the World was shortlisted for the Highland Book Prize and longlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize. His latest novel That Beautiful Atlantic Waltz is set in Shetland.

Former deputy editor and managing editor of The Scotsman, Writer-at-large for the Sunday Herald Alan is also the co-founder and editor of The Scottish Review of Books. He was editor of the centenary editions of the collected novels of Muriel Spark and has edited several acclaimed anthologies. He also wrote the bestselling Appointment in Arezzo: A Friendship with Muriel Spark and edited Madly, Deeply: The Alan Rickman Diaries. His latest work as editor coming October 2024 is Edinburgh: The Autobiography.

Chris is an author and lifelong runner who uses exercise and nature to manage his mental health. Chris was diagnosed as autistic at the age of 40 and is a passionate advocate for mental health awareness. He lives in Dundee, where he was part of the team who created V&A Dundee, Scotland’s design museum. Fray, his debut novel, is a missing-person mystery set in the menacing Scottish highland wilderness.