Modern Scottish Writing

Never mind Gary Barlow and BBC promotion. We warned you to watch out for more Jim Naughtie than is reasonable coming in February, to coincide with the publication of his "sophisticated" Cold War thriller, The Madness Of July.  Now we have an alert for chef, break-dancer and tv mogul Kirsty Wark, who's been using train journeys between London and Glasgow to write her first novel, The Legacy of Elizabeth Pringle, "a multi-generational story of love and belonging set on the Scottish island of Arran". This will be published in March.

We're told she's already started on a second book.

Kirsty's publishers are Two Roads Books, an imprint of Hodder & Stoughton, who are also publishing Sally Magnusson's book about her mother, Where Memories Go: Why Dementia Changes Everything.