Andrew Martin | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 6 July 1962 |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Genre | Crime Fiction |
| Notable works | Jim Stringer, Steam Detective |
| Website | |
| martinesque | |
Andrew Martin (born 6 July 1962) is an English journalist, rail historian, crime novelist, and writer of fiction and non-fiction. He is the author of more than 30 books, many about railways. He is also a broadcaster, and writes a Substack, Reading on Trains.
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Martin was brought up in Yorkshire, studied at Merton College, Oxford, and qualified as a barrister. [1] After being named Spectator 'Young Writer of the Year' in 1988, he began working as a journalist, at first on the staff of national newspapers and magazines, then freelance. His first novel, 'Bilton', a satire on journalism, appeared in 1999. It was followed in 2001 by 'The Bobby Dazzlers', about a gang of burglars in York. The Guardian claimed Bilton and The Bobby Dazzlers "rank high in the lists of the best comic novels published in the past 10 years". [2]
His series of detective novels about Jim Stringer, a railwayman reassigned to the North Eastern Railway police in Edwardian England, includes The Necropolis Railway (set on the real London Necropolis Railway), The Blackpool Highflyer, The Lost Luggage Porter, Murder at Deviation Junction, Death on a Branch Line, The Last Train to Scarborough, The Somme Stations (Winner of the CWA Ellis Peters Historical Award 2011) [3] , The Baghdad Railway Club. [4] , 'Night Train to Jamalpur'and 'Powder Smoke'.
His other crime fiction includes The Yellow Diamond, A Crime of the Super-Rich'(2015), a detective novel set in London's Mayfair; 'Soot' (2017), set in 18th century York; 'The Winker' (2019), about a failed pop star who winks at people, then kills them. As A.J. Martin, he wrote 'The Night in Venice', about a 14 year old schoolgirl unsure whether she has killed her guardian or merely dreamt it. His novel 'The Moquette Mystery', set in interwar London, was published in 2025.
He has also written a number of works of non-fiction. Railway-related titles include Underground Overground, A Passenger's History of the Tube;Belles and Whistles, Five Journeys Through Time on Britain's Trains and Night Trains, The Rise and Fall of the Sleeper. [5]
Other non-fiction works include How to Get Things Really Flat; [6] Ghoul Britannia and Flight by Elephant about Gyles Mackrell and his Burmese, elephant-assisted wartime rescue mission, published in 2013.
In addition, he is the editor of a dictionary of humorous quotations: Funny You Should Say That: A Compendium of Jokes, Quips and Quotations from Cicero to the Simpsons.
His works for television and radio include: Between the Lines, Railways in Fiction and Film (2008), [7] Disappearing Dad, Fathers in Literature (2010), [8] The Trains that Time Forgot: Britain's Lost Railway Journeys (2015), [9] all in the Timeshift series, and three essay series for Radio 3, The Sound and The Fury (2013), [10] England Ejects (2014), The Further Realm (2015). [11] He also writes short stories for the Calm app.
Martin writes and performs music under the name Brunswick Green. [12]
Martin lives in north London with his wife and sons.
