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Alex Gray (author)

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Alex Gray
Alex Gray (2007)
Alex Gray (2007)
BornSandra Gray Lang
(1950-05-27) 27 May 1950 (age 74)
Glasgow
Pen nameAlex Gray
OccupationAuthor
NationalityBritish
GenreCrime fiction
Website
www.alexgrayauthor.co.uk

Alex Gray (born 27 May 1950) is a Scottish crime writer. She has published 19 novels, all set around Glasgow and featuring the character of Detective Chief Inspector Lorimer and his psychological profiler Solomon Brightman, the earlier novels being published by Canongate and Allison & Busby and later books by Little Brown. She has also published magazine articles, poetry and short stories as well as stories for BBC radio schools programmes.

Biography

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Alex Gray (born Sandra Gray Lang)[1][2] was brought up in the Craigbank area of Glasgow and attended Hutchesons' Grammar School. Her father was a telecommunications engineer and her mother, originally from Tobermory on the Isle of Mull, was a telephone exchange operator. She studied English and Philosophy[3] at Strathclyde University and was a founding member of Battlefield Band.[4] She worked for a period in the Department of Health & Social Security,[5] before training as an English teacher. In 1976, she lived in Rhodesia for three months, during which time she married.[6] Thereafter, she continued teaching in Scotland until the 1990s, when she began to write full-time. Gray is a member of the Femmes Fatales crime writing trio, together with Alanna Knight and Lin Anderson. She is the co-founder with Anderson of Bloody Scotland, Scotland's first international crime writing festival, which takes place in Stirling.[2] Gray has two children and two grandchildren;[7] she lives with her husband in Renfrewshire.[citation needed]

Gray has published 21 novels in the Lorimer series.

Awards

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In November 2024, Gray was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of the West of Scotland.[8]

Bibliography

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  • Never Somewhere Else (2002)
  • A Small Weeping (2004)
  • Shadows of Sounds (2005)
  • The Riverman (2007)
  • Pitch Black (2008)
  • Glasgow Kiss (2009)
  • Five Ways To Kill A Man (2010)
  • Sleep like the Dead (2011)
  • A Pound of Flesh (2012)
  • The Swedish Girl (2013)
  • The Bird That Did Not Sing (2014)
  • Keep The Midnight Out (2015)
  • The Darkest Goodbye (2016)
  • Still Dark (2017)
  • Only the Dead Can Tell (2018)
  • The Stalker (2019)
  • When Shadows Fall (2020)
  • Before the Storm (2021)
  • Echo of the Dead (2022)
  • Questions for a Dead Man (2023)
  • Out of Darkness (2024)

References

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  1. ^ "Battlefield Band". Scottish Traditional Music Hall of Fame. 19 September 2016. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
  2. ^ a b Christie, Janet (8 March 2014). "Alex Gray on how ill-health influenced her writing". The Scotsman. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
  3. ^ "Alex Gray". Scotland is the Place. Archived from the original on 28 October 2009.
  4. ^ "Sir Billy Connolly joins me in Scottish Traditional Music Hall of Fame: I'm a founder member of The Battlefield Band". Twitter. 28 September 2017. Retrieved 28 September 2017.
  5. ^ "Biography". Archived from the original on 11 May 2010. Retrieved 12 August 2009.
  6. ^ Spowart, Nan (21 October 2021). "Alex Gray: 10 things that changed my life". The National. Retrieved 1 February 2023.
  7. ^ McDonald, Sally (20 November 2019). "Meet the author: The Stalker writer Alex Gray". The Sunday Post. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
  8. ^ "Award-winning Scottish crime writer celebrated at UWS graduation". www.uws.ac.uk. Retrieved 19 November 2024.
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