Lewis Grassic Gibbon (James Leslie Mitchell) was one of the finest writers of the twentieth century. Born in Aberdeenshire in 1901, he died at the age of thirty-four. He was a prolific writer of novels, short stories, essays and science fiction, and his writing reflected his wide interest in religion, archaeology, history, politics and science. The Mearns trilogy, A Scots Quair, is his most renowned work, and has become a landmark in Scottish literature.

Kapka Kassabova is the author of Street without a Name (2008), the unsentimental story of a Communist childhood which was shortlisted for the Prix Européen du Livre and the Dolman Travel Book Award. Her essays and articles have appeared in the Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, The Sunday Times, the Scottish Review of Books and on BBC Radio 4 and Radio 3. Kassabova lives in the Scottish Highlands.