About The Author

Steph SwainstonI come from Bradford. I studied archaeology at Cambridge, being the first of my family to go to university. I then worked as an archaeologist for three years, gaining an M.Phil from the University of Wales. I specialised in stone artefacts especially those from Paviland Cave, South Wales. In the museum collections I identified a new type of stone tool which could help to date human presence before the height of the last Ice Age. I also discovered some human bones belonging to the famous burial. They've been radiocarbon dated: the young man of Paviland lived more than thirty-three thousand years ago.

I have excavated a few other palaeolithic cave sites in Israel and Wales, a mesolithic site in Yorkshire and a Roman military camp in Scotland.

After happily working in bookshops, I went on to be a researcher in a company that developed herbal medicines. Among other projects, the company identified traditional medicinal plants in Bhutan, including some new to science and introduced vanilla to Uganda. It helped subsistence farmers beat poverty by teaching them to grow, process and export cash crops. I then enjoyed working in defence research for the MOD.

When not writing or reading I love walking, hiking and the outdoors. I like watching wildlife, particularly birds. I try all kinds of adventure sports - I did some hang gliding to see the world from Jant’s perspective and diving to see the ocean from Mimosa’s perspective but I’ve also done a lot of caving and boating. I believe seeing these things at first hand is necessary to provide true insight for writing. I'm addicted to coffee and I love malt whisky.

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