KERRY BAILEY is a freelance journalist based in Kent. Storybook Britain (Penguin Press) is her delightful and informative family guide to the geographical locations of favourite children's books and the places and buildings linked to them.

PHILIP BARCLAY is a British diplomat who has been based in Harare for the last three years. He has used his experience to write Inside Zimbabwe (Bloomsbury), a personal account of this once-prosperous country's descent into political, economic, and social chaos.

QUENTIN BATES went native in Iceland, married a local, and worked as a seaman among other trades before turning to maritime journalism. Frozen Assets (Constable) is the first of a series of crime novels featuring Gunna, an independent-minded woman police sergeant in a small fishing community who finds herself tackling the financial and political corruption that has brought Iceland to its knees.

HELEN BLACK is the pen name of a solicitor specialising in child care cases. Damaged Goods (Avon) is the first in a series of hard-hitting crime novels featuring Lilly Valentine, a solicitor who defends a child accused of killing her own drug-addicted mother. A Place of Safety (Avon) sees Lilly dealing with people trafficking, rape, and murder. In A Matter of Honour (Avon), Lilly tackles intimidation and murder among the Muslim community . www.hblack.co.uk  www.collins-crime.co.uk

S.J. BOLTON trained as an actor and dancer. Sacrifice (Bantam), her fictional debut, is a contemporary thriller in which a series of kidnaps and murders in a remote island community are linked to an ancient Shetland legend. Film rights optioned. Her engrossing second novel, Awakening (Bantam), is also set in a small community haunted by its past . www.SJBolton.com  www.booksattransworld.co.uk

DRUIN BURCH is a working doctor. Digging Up the Dead (Chatto), which received a Jerwood Award for Non-fiction, uses his own experience, combined with meticulous research, to recreate the gruesome world of 19^th-century medicine in a biography of Astley Cooper, celebrity surgeon and radical vivisectionist. His second book, Taking the Medicine (Chatto), is about our relationship with medical drugs and the ways we have learnt to understand them. www.randomhouse.co.uk

MARTIN CONWAY is the pen name of an actor and scriptwriter whose first novel for children, Olaf the Viking (Oxford), is an epic comedy about a 12-year-old boy who gets involved in battles between the Norse gods and giants, as well as the carousing, marauding, and pillaging of his fellow humans. Olaf’s adventures continue in The Pig Who Would Be King (Oxford). www.oup.com/oxed/children

ANNA CROSBIE is a New Zealander, whose How To Publish Your Own Book (How To Books) is an indispensable guide to a growing trend. www.howtobooks.co.uk

ANDREW CULLEN is a playwright and screenwriter whose first book, From Here to Paternity (Fusion Press)is the painfully truthful travel diary of an expectant father’s journey to parenthood. www.andrewcullen.net   www.visionpaperbacks.co.uk

VANESSA CURTIS is a freelance journalist and the author of two books on Virginia Woolf. Zelah Green: Queen of Clean (Egmont), the first in a series of children’s novels, is a striking, funny, and touching record of a 14-year-old battling Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Shortlisted for the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize 2009. Zelah Green: Dating Queen (Egmont) is the second book in this distinctive series. www.vanessacurtis.com www.egmont.co.uk

J. D. DAVIES is a leading authority on maritime history in the seventeenth century and has written the definitive work on the ships, men, and organisation of Pepys's navy. His first novel, Gentleman Captain (Old Street) , begins an absorbing adventure series featuring Matthew Quinton, a Royalist officer whose career spans the naval wars and great events of the Restoration age.

WILL DAVIS is an exciting new voice in fiction. His debut novel My Side of the Story (Bloomsbury) is the first-person account of a self-aware, witty teenager who has no problem with being gay – though everyone else does. Winner of the Betty Trask Prize 2007. Will's new novel, Dream Machine (Bloomsbury) tells the interlocking stories of the women competing in a tv reality show. www.bloomsbury.com

CATHERINE DEVENEY has been Scottish Feature Writer of the Year several times. Ties That Bind (Old Street) is the moving story of a woman who uses a secret win on the horses to go missing and create a new identity, only to find she cannot escape the old one.

TRACY GILPIN is a South African media consultant whose fast-moving crime novel, Double Cross (Harlequin), features Dunai Marks, a single mother of mixed race living in contemporary Cape Town, who investigates the killing of her mentor with the help of Carl Lambrecht, a tough private detective. Double Take is the second in this dramatic series.

CORA HARRISON lives in Ireland where her two dozen children’s books are bestsellers. My Lady Judge (Macmillan), her adult debut, is the first in a series of mysteries set in the Burren in 16^th-century Ireland, featuring the learned and practical Mara, a woman Brehon or investigating magistrate. Michaelmas Tribute (Macmillan) and Sting of Justice (Macmillan) continue the Burren series. Cora is also working on I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend (Macmillan), and Alfie Sykes & the Montgomery Murder (Piccadilly Press), both for younger readers. www.coraharrison.com  www.panmacmillan.com

GEORGETTE HEYER invented the Regency romance. Her historical novels remain in print all over the world more than thirty years after her death. She also wrote a dozen detective stories, which continue to enjoy a wide readership.  www.randomhouse.co.uk

MICHAEL HUTCHINSON holds a record number of national cycling titles. His first book, The Hour (Yellow Jersey Press), combines the history of this cycling grail with his own attempt at capturing the record. He won Best New Writer Award at the 2007 British Sports Book Awards. His second book, Hello Sailor (Yellow Jersey) , is about the world of competitive yachting. www.randomhouse.co.uk

BEVERLEY JONES worked as a reporter in print and tv in Wales before taking up her current job as a press and media officer. Telling Stories, her first novel, is a beautifully observed and wittily narrated tale of love, lust, and criminal intentions in Cardiff.

BERYL KINGSTON is a hugely popular writer of sagas and romances. The Gates of Paradise (Allison & Busby) centres on the trial for sedition and acquittal of the poet William Blake in the Sussex village of Felpham. Neptune’s Daughter (Transita) is a contemporary novel about a widow learning to enjoy life until her daughter tries to land her with a new baby. Octavia and Octavia's War (Allison & Busby) follow the fortunes of an independently-minded young woman determined to change the world from the early years of the 20th century to the dark days of World War II. www.berylkingston.co.uk  www.allisonandbusby.ltd.uk  www.transita.co.uk

POLYCHRONIS KOUTSAKIS is a novelist, screenwriter, and award-winning playwright whose work has been performed in his native Greece, as well as the UK and USA. His magical novel Time Acrobats was born from the idea that two people, madly in love, could be personally responsible for many of the major events of the 20th century. Sacred Way Blues, by contrast, is the first of a series of crime novels set in contemporary Athens, narrated by the morally upright and incorruptible Stratos, who happens to be a professional hitman. www.polychronis.com

RUTH MASON is an Irishwoman married to an Englishman, and The Legacy of Ice, her lyrical first book, brings alive her son's genetic inheritance by taking the reader on a journey from the origins of humanity to the end of the ice ages.

IAN MATHIE is a Scot whose lifelong fascination with Africa began in infancy. He was a rural development officer in Zaire in the 1970s, and Bride Price is the mesmerising story of his initiation into tribal customs and how he saved his foster-daughter from an unsuitable marriage.

MIRIAM MORRISON was a journalist, and also ran a country inn in the Lake District. Her experience informs Recipe for Disaster (Arrow), a romantic comedy about the titanic clash of egos, attitudes and recipes when two star chefs open restaurants in the same small town. Shortlisted for the Melissa Nathan Comedy Romance Award 2009. Her second novel is The Cinderella Effect (Arrow). www.randomhouse.co.uk

PHILIP PURSER is the author of ten books of fiction and non-fiction and several plays for tv and radio. His latest novel, Lights in the Sky (Severn House) is a taut thriller about a young British pilot sent behind German lines in 1943 to bring out some escapees from Treblinka.

RICHARD PIERS RAYNER did the art work for the graphic novel “The Road to Perdition” and has written and illustrated Middlesbrough: An Alternative History (Breedon Books) about the football club where he is artist-in-residence.

WILL RAWSON lives on England's south coast, where he is a playwright and interactive guru. The Thief of Forever is the first in a series of children's books about a secret rip in the space-time continuum that threatens life as we know it. His short story, Tremble with Fear, appeared in "Wow! 366" (Scholastic) to celebrate the National Year of Reading.

BINA SHAH is well known in Pakistan as the author of novels and short stories. Children of Sindh is the compelling story of a young tv news reporter caught up in the events surrounding the return of Benazir Bhutto to Pakistan, culminating in her assassination. www.binashah.net

NIAMH SHAW is a corporate escapee who writes in between caring for her Siamese Fighting Fish. Smart/Casual (Headline), her first novel, is a romantic comedy in which a career girl is framed for sabotage and wreaks a terrible revenge.

PAUL ROBERT SMITH is an Australian whose first novel, Up a Tree in the Park at Night with a Hedgehog (Vintage), is a brilliantly funny story about a man avoiding commitment and feeling bad about not feeling worse. Paul has finished his second novel, Sunday Daffodil & Other Happy Endings (Vintage). www.randomhouse.co.uk

IVO STOURTON grew up in London, Washington and Paris, and has an English degree from Cambridge. The Night Climbers (Doubleday), his first novel, is an original, disturbing, and beautifully written story about a small group of students who commit a multi-million pound art fraud. Film rights optioned. www.booksattransworld.co.uk

VIKAS SWARUP is an Indian diplomat. Q&A (Doubleday), his debut novel, is about a young Mumbai waiter who wins a billion rupees (£13 million) in a tv quiz show and is promptly arrested and accused of cheating. It has been reissued as Slumdog Millionaire, after the film version directed by Danny Boyle. (Translation rights sold in 41 languages.) Vikas's new novel, Six Suspects (Doubleday), is a multi-layered story about crime and corruption in contemporary India. Film rights optioned. www.vikasswarup.net  www.booksattransworld.co.uk

NICK VAN BLOSS is a pianist who has suffered from Tourette’s Syndrome since he was seven. Busy Body (Fusion Press) is his heart-breakingly honest, humorous, and unselfpitying account of learning to live with this incurable affliction. www.visionpaperbacks.co.uk

MIKE WALTERS is a much-travelled management consultant whose first novel The Shadow Walker (Quercus) is a gripping thriller set in Mongolia. In charge of the investigation is Nergui, a detective as fascinating and mysterious as his country. The Adversary (Quercus) is the second book in this unique series, followed by The Outcast (Quercus).www.theshadowwalker.com  www.quercusbooks.co.uk

CAROLINE WALTON has published several books on Russia and is married to a Russian-Ukrainian. The Besieged is a beautifully observed account of her conversations with survivors of the wartime siege of Leningrad (now St Petersburg). The result is a deeply personal and a universal story about survival in extreme circumstances.