James Graham Ballard was an English novelist, short story writer, satirist, and essayist who first became associated with the New Wave of science fiction for his post-apocalyptic novels such as The Drowned World (1962). In the late 1960s, he produced a variety of experimental short stories, such as those collected in the controversial The Atrocity Exhibition (1970). In the mid 1970s, Ballard published several novels, among them the highly controversial Crash (1973), a story about symphorophilia and car crash fetishism, and High-Rise (1975), a depiction of a luxury apartment building's descent into violent chaos.
Jeffrey Howard Archer, Baron Archer of Weston-super-Mare is an English novelist, former politician, convicted perjurer, and peer of the realm. Before becoming an author, Archer was a Member of Parliament (1969–1974), but did not seek re-election after a financial scandal that left him almost bankrupt. He revived his fortunes as a best-selling novelist; his books have sold more than 320 million copies worldwide.
Martin Louis Amis is a British novelist, essayist, memoirist, and screenwriter. He is best known for his novels Money (1984) and London Fields (1989). He received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his memoir Experience and has been listed for the Booker Prize twice. Amis served as the Professor of Creative Writing at the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester until 2011. In 2008, The Times named him one of the 50 greatest British writers since 1945.
William Woodard Self is an English author, journalist, political commentator and broadcaster. He has written eleven novels, five collections of shorter fiction, three novellas, and five collections of non-fiction writing.
Michael Chabon is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, graduating in 1984. He subsequently received a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine.
Patricia Cornwell is an American crime writer. She is known for her best-selling novels featuring medical examiner Kay Scarpetta, of which the first was inspired by a series of sensational murders in Richmond, Virginia, where most of the stories are set. The plots are notable for their emphasis on forensic science, which has influenced later TV treatments of police work. Cornwell has also initiated new research into the Jack the Ripper killings, incriminating the popular British artist Walter Sickert. Her books have sold more than 100 million copies.
Cornell George Hopley Woolrich was an American novelist and short story writer. He sometimes used the pseudonyms William Irish and George Hopley.
The Hutton Inquiry was a 2003 judicial inquiry in the UK chaired by Lord Hutton, who was appointed by the Labour government to investigate the circumstances surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly, a biological warfare expert and former UN weapons inspector in Iraq.
Patrick Bateman is a fictional character and the protagonist, as well as the narrator, of the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, and its film adaptation. He is a wealthy, materialistic Wall Street investment banker who leads a secret life as a serial killer. Bateman has also briefly appeared in other Ellis novels and their film and theatrical adaptations
David Mark Joseph Morrissey is an English actor and filmmaker. Described by the British Film Institute as "one of the most versatile English actors of his generation", he is noted for the meticulous preparation and research he undertakes for his roles.
Donald Barthelme was an American short story writer and novelist known for his playful, postmodernist style of short fiction. Barthelme also worked as a newspaper reporter for the Houston Post, was managing editor of Location magazine, director of the Contemporary Arts Museum in Houston (1961–1962), co-founder of Fiction, and a professor at various universities. He also was one of the original founders of the University of Houston Creative Writing Program.
Henry Reymond Fitzwalter "Harry" Keating was an English crime fiction writer most notable for his series of novels featuring Inspector Ghote of the Bombay CID.
Henry Hitchings is an author, reviewer and critic, specializing in narrative non-fiction, with a particular emphasis on language and cultural history. The second of his books, The Secret Life of Words: How English Became English, won the 2008 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and a Somerset Maugham Award. He has written two books about Samuel Johnson and has served as the president of the Johnson Society of Lichfield. As a critic, he has mainly written about books and theatre. As of 2018, he is chair of the drama section of the UK's Critics' Circle.
Zack Busner is a recurring character in the fiction of British author Will Self, appearing in the short story collections The Quantity Theory of Insanity, Grey Area, Dr. Mukti and Other Tales of Woe, the novels Great Apes, The Book of Dave, and the 2010s novel trilogy Umbrella, Shark and Phone.
The Quantity Theory of Insanity is a collection of short stories by Will Self. It won the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize in 1993.
Grey Area is the second collection of short stories by the author Will Self.
The 2012 Booker Prize for Fiction was awarded on 16 October 2012. A longlist of twelve titles was announced on 25 July, and these were narrowed down to a shortlist of six titles, announced on 11 September. The jury was chaired by Sir Peter Stothard, editor of the Times Literary Supplement, accompanied by literary critics Dinah Birch and Bharat Tandon, historian and biographer Amanda Foreman, and Dan Stevens, actor of Downton Abbey fame with a background English Literature studies. The jury was faced with the controversy of the 2011 jury, whose approach had been seen as overly populist. Whether or not as a response to this, the 2012 jury strongly emphasised the value of literary quality and linguistic innovation as criteria for inclusion.
Umbrella is the ninth novel by Will Self, published in 2012.
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is a Gothic novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, first published in 1886. The work is also known as The Strange Case of Jekyll Hyde, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, or simply Jekyll and Hyde. It is about a London legal practitioner named Gabriel John Utterson who investigates strange occurrences between his old friend, Dr Henry Jekyll, and the evil Edward Hyde. The novella's impact is such that it has become a part of the language, with the vernacular phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" referring to persons with an unpredictably dual nature: outwardly good, but sometimes shockingly evil.
Shark is the tenth novel by Will Self, published in 2014.
