I Am A Reader: Our Authors

Introducing our I Am A Reader Authors

Each of our I Am A Reader groups worked with a successful author - find out more about them on this page. 

Eve Makis

Eve Makis is the author of four novels published by Transworld and Sandstone Press, and a recipient of the Young Booksellers International Book of the Year Award. Her fourth book The Spice Box Letters was shortlisted for the Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize and the East Midlands Book Award. Her co-written life-writing guide The Accidental Memoir was written with support from the Arts Council and published by Harper Collins in 2018. In 2015, she wrote Boy on the Bridge, a feature-length adaptation of her third book. Filmed on location in Cyprus, the feature was voted best film at the European Cinema Panorama Film Festival in Athens, Festival Du Grain a Demure in Normandy and at Buzz CEE Film Festival. Her works have been translated into eight languages. Eve has just completed an eighteen-month writing residency at Nottingham Trent University where she teaches fiction on the MA in Creative Writing. Find her books on our library catalogue. 

Stephan Collishaw

Stephan Collishaw was born, and now lives, in Nottingham. He studied at Goldsmith’s College, London before becoming a teacher. Some years later he completed the MA in Creative Writing at Nottingham Trent University. He has published four novels, the first three of which – The Lost Girl, Amber (both published by Sceptre) and The Song of the Stork (Legend Press) – are set in Lithuania, where he lived for a year, and his most recent novel A Child Called Happiness (Legend Press)  is set in Zimbabwe. In 2016 Stephan established Noir Press, which is the only UK publisher of the work of contemporary Lithuanian novelists in English. Alongside writing he continues to work as a deputy head teacher. Find his books on our library catalogue. 

Clare Harvey

Clare Harvey was born in North Devon and she spent part of her childhood living in Mauritius. She is the author of four novels with historical settings. Her first book The Gunner Girl won both the Exeter Novel Prize and the Joan Hessayon Award for debut fiction and was followed by The English Agent, The Night Raid and The Escape. Clare took a diploma in fine art at Plymouth University, followed by a degree in Law at the University of Leicester. She also has postgraduate qualifications in print journalism and English tuition, and an MA in Creative Writing from the University of Nottingham. Her fifth novel, set in wartime Mauritius, is awaiting publication, and she’s currently working on her sixth. Find her books on our library catalogue. 

Jacob Ross

Jacob Ross is a novelist, short story writer, editor and creative writing tutor. His crime fiction novel The Bone Readers won the inaugural Jhalak Prize in 2017. His literary novel Pynter Bender was published to much critical literary acclaim and was shortlisted for the 2009 Commonwealth Writers Regional Prize and chosen as one of the British Authors' Club’s top three Best First Novels. His book is Tell No-One About This, a collection of stories written over a span of forty years, including Song for Simone (1986) and A Way to Catch the Dust (1999) and more than a dozen new ones. His novel Black Rain Falling was published in 2021. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and has been a judge of the V.S. Pritchett Memorial Prize, the Olive Cook, Scott Moncrieff and Tom-Gallon Literary Awards. Jacob is Associate Fiction Editor at Peepal Tree Press, for whom he edited Closure, Contemporary Black British short stories.  Find his books on our library catalogue. 

Joanne Limburg

Joanne Limburg was born and grew up in London and now lives in Cambridge. She has published two collections of poetry with Bloodaxe Books: Feminismo, shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection, and Paraphernalia, a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. A collection for children Bookside Down was shortlisted for the CLPE Poetry Prize. Her latest poetry collection is The Autistic Alice, also published by Bloodaxe. Her non-poetry book The Woman Who Thought Too Much, a memoir about OCD, anxiety and poetry is published by Atlantic Books and her debut novel A Want of Kindness was published in July 2015. A second memoir Small Pieces: A Book of Lamentations appeared in July 2017 and this year Letters to My Weird Sisters: on Autism and Feminism was published by Atlantic Books. Joanne completed a PhD in Creative Writing at Kingston University and now lectures at De Montfort University in Leicester. Find her books on our library catalogue. 

Joanne is autistic and will be working with our group of neurodiverse readers.

Mahsuda Snaith

Mahsuda Snaith was born in Luton and brought up in Leicester, where she still lives. She is a writer of novels and short stories. Her debut novel The Things We Thought We Knew (Black Swan) was released in 2017 when she was named an Observer New Face of Fiction. Her second novel How to Find Home (Black Swan) was chosen as a BBC Radio 4 ‘Book at Bedtime’. She is the winner of the SI Leeds Literary Prize 2014 and Bristol Short Story Prize 2014. Mahsuda has led creative writing workshops in universities, hospitals, schools and a homeless hostel and has worked as a writing mentor for a variety of writing organisations. She is a commissioned writer for the Colonia Countryside project and her short story The Panther’s Tale is included in Hag: Forgotten Folktales Retold (Virago, and available as a podcast from Audible). Mahsuda is currently working on her third novel. Find her books on our library catalogue.

Mahsuda will be working with our invited group from Broxtowe Women's Project.