Stephanie Merritt

Last updated

Merritt in 2016 Hayfestival-2016-Stephanie-Merritt.jpg
Merritt in 2016

Stephanie Jane Merritt (born 1974 in Surrey) [1] is an English literary critic and writer who has contributed to publications including The Times , The Daily Telegraph , the New Statesman , New Humanist and Die Welt . She was Deputy Literary Editor of The Observer from 1998 to 2005 and currently writes for The Observer and The Guardian , in addition to writing novels — under her own name as well as the pseudonym S. J. Parris. [2] [3]

Contents

Merritt read English at Queens' College, Cambridge, and graduated from Cambridge University in 1996. [3] She represented Queens' College on the 2024-2025 season of Christmas University Challenge. The team from Queens' College finished runners-up.

Merritt's first novel Gaveston (Faber & Faber) won a Betty Trask Award from the Society of Authors in 2002. Her second novel was Real (2005), about a struggling young playwright, for which she was also commissioned to write the screenplay. [3] In 2010, Heresy was published, her first novel in the series of historical fiction thrillers featuring Giordano Bruno. [4] [5] It was followed by Prophecy (2011) Sacrilege (2012), Treachery (2014), [6] Conspiracy (2016) and Execution (2020).

She has also written a memoir, The Devil Within, published by Vermilion in 2008 and shortlisted for the Mind Book Award, which discusses her experiences living with clinical depression. [7] [8]

Merritt has appeared regularly as a critic and panellist on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio 4 Extra, has been a judge for the Costa Biography Award and the Orange New Writing Award as well as the Perrier Award, and is a regular interviewer and author at literary festivals, as well as the National Theatre. During 2007 and 2008, she curated the Talks and Debates programme on issues in contemporary arts and politics at London's Soho Theatre. [9]

Bibliography

As Stephanie Merritt

As S. J. Parris

Series based on the Italian philosopher Giordano Bruno (1548–1600)

The prequel novellas that make up The Dead of Winter have been published separately as e-books as well.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joanne Harris</span> British author (born 1964)

Joanne Michèle Sylvie Harris is a British author, best known for her 1999 novel Chocolat, which was adapted into a film of the same name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zadie Smith</span> British writer (born 1975)

Zadie Smith is an English novelist, essayist, and short-story writer. Her debut novel, White Teeth (2000), immediately became a best-seller and won a number of awards. She became a tenured professor in the Creative Writing faculty of New York University in September 2010.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hanif Kureishi</span> English writer (born 1954)

Hanif Kureishi is a British Pakistani playwright, screenwriter, filmmaker, and novelist. He is known for his film My Beautiful Laundrette and novel The Buddha of Suburbia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anna Funder</span> Australian author (born 1966)

Anna Funder is an Australian author. She is the author of Stasiland, All That I Am, Wifedom: Mrs Orwell’s Invisible Life and the novella The Girl With the Dogs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karin Slaughter</span> American crime writer (born 1971)

Karin Slaughter is an American crime writer. She has written 24 novels, which have sold more than 40 million copies and have been published in 120 countries. Her first novel, Blindsighted (2001), was published in 27 languages and made the Crime Writers' Association's Dagger Award shortlist for "Best Thriller Debut" of 2001.

<i>The Final Solution</i> (novel) 2004 novella by Michael Chabon

The Final Solution: A Story of Detection is a 2004 novella by Michael Chabon. It is a detective story that in many ways pays homage to the writings of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and other writers of the genre. The story, set in 1944, revolves around an unnamed 89-year-old long-retired detective, now interested mostly in beekeeping, and his quest to find a missing parrot, the only friend of a mute Jewish boy. The title of the novella references Doyle's 1893 Sherlock Holmes story "The Final Problem" and the Final Solution, as well as The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, a 1974 novel written in homage to Conan Doyle by Nicholas Meyer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Julia Copus</span> British poet, biographer and childrens writer

Julia Copus FRSL is a British poet, biographer and children's writer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ira Mathur</span> Trinidadian and Tobago journalist and novelist

Ira Mathur is an Indian-born Trinidad and Tobago multimedia freelance journalist, Sunday Guardian columnist and writer. The longest-running columnist for the Sunday Guardian, she has been writing an op-ed for the paper since 1995, except for a hiatus from 2003 to 2004 when she wrote for the Daily Express. She has written more than eight hundred columns on politics, economics, social, health and developmental issues, locally, regionally and internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maggie O'Farrell</span> Irish-British novelist (born 1972)

Maggie O'Farrell, RSL, is a novelist from Northern Ireland. Her acclaimed first novel, After You'd Gone, won the Betty Trask Award, and a later one, The Hand That First Held Mine, the 2010 Costa Novel Award. She has twice been shortlisted since for the Costa Novel Award for Instructions for a Heatwave in 2014 and This Must Be The Place in 2017. She appeared in the Waterstones 25 Authors for the Future. Her memoir I Am, I Am, I Am: Seventeen Brushes with Death reached the top of the Sunday Times bestseller list. Her novel Hamnet won the Women's Prize for Fiction in 2020, and the fiction prize at the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Awards. The Marriage Portrait was shortlisted for the 2023 Women's Prize for Fiction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claire Keegan</span> Irish writer (born 1968)

Claire Keegan is an Irish writer known for her short stories, which have been published in The New Yorker, Best American Short Stories, Granta, and The Paris Review. She is also known for her novellas, two of which have been adapted as films.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anna Burns</span> Irish writer (born 1962)

Anna Burns FRSL is an author from Northern Ireland. Her novel Milkman won the 2018 Booker Prize, the 2019 Orwell Prize for political fiction, and the 2020 International Dublin Literary Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helen FitzGerald</span> Australian writer

Helen FitzGerald is an Australian novelist and screenwriter. Her debut novel, Dead Lovely, was published by Allen & Unwin in 2007, and The Exit in 2015 by Faber & Faber. Viral was released in 2016.

Mavis Mary Cheek was an English novelist. She was the author of fifteen novels, several of which have been translated into other languages. Cheeks' debut novel Pause Between Acts won the 1988 She/John Menzies First Novel Prize.

Underhill is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jennifer L. Armentrout</span> American author

Jennifer Lynn Armentrout, also known by the pseudonym J. Lynn, is an American writer of contemporary romance, new adult and fantasy. Several of her works have made The New York Times Best Seller list.

Claire Kilroy is a contemporary Irish author. She was born, and currently resides, in Dublin, Ireland.

Lisa McInerney is an Irish novelist, short story writer, essayist, editor and screenwriter. She is best known for her novel, The Glorious Heresies, which was the 2016 winner of the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction.

Rosalind Barber is an English novelist, poet and academic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sally Rooney</span> Irish author (born 1991)

Sally Rooney is an Irish author and screenwriter. She has published four novels: Conversations with Friends (2017), Normal People (2018), Beautiful World, Where Are You (2021), and Intermezzo (2024). The first two were adapted into the television miniseries Normal People (2020) and Conversations with Friends (2022).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ingrid Persaud</span> Trinidad and Tobago-born writer, artist, academic

Ingrid Persaud is a Trinidad and Tobago-born writer, artist, and academic, who lives in the United Kingdom. She won the BBC National Short Story Award in 2018 and the Commonwealth Short Story Prize in 2017 with her debut short story "The Sweet Sop". The narrative around an estranged father and son reuniting through their shared love for chocolate.

References

  1. Faber and Faber: author profile: Stephanie Merritt
  2. The Guardian: profile Stephanie Merritt
  3. 1 2 3 "Stephanie Merritt". BBC Newsnight Review. BBC News. 20 October 2005.
  4. The Washington Post: book review: Heresy, 27 February 2010.
  5. Seattle Pi: critical book review: Heresy, 6 June 2011.
  6. Trachery cover art and synopsis Archived 4 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine , 3 October 2013.
  7. Stephanie Merritt, The Devil Within: A Memoir of Depression (2009)
  8. The Guardian: Stephanie Merritt, My time in therapy, 7 March 2009.
  9. Curtis Brown: author profile: Stephanie Merritt, UK.