Hi, I’m Alison Baillie. Thanks for visiting my website.

Although I was born in Yorkshire and brought up in Ilkley in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, I have always felt Scottish. My parents were both Scottish and I studied English at the University of St Andrews and afterwards taught English at several High Schools in the Edinburgh area. I have also taught English as a Foreign Language in Finland and Switzerland.

 I love reading crime fiction, especially Scottish and Scandinavian, going to crime writing festivals, travelling, walking in the mountains and being with my friends and family.

My first book, Sewing the Shadows Together, was published in 2015. It had been in my mind for more than thirty years before I wrote it, inspired by my time teaching English at Portobello High School in Edinburgh.  There were several high-profile murders at that time and once the murders were solved I couldn’t stop thinking about the families and wondering how they would ever be able to get over what had happened. The book explores how the dark shadows of the past always influence the present.

I had thought I only had one book in me, but as soon as my first book was published, the idea for a second one came into my head and I had to write it. It is influenced by my own life and places I have lived, Switzerland, Scarborough in Yorkshire, St Andrews and Edinburgh, especially Portobello. A Fractured Winter took two years to write and went through several direction changes, title changes, and near abandonment, but I’m thrilled that it’s now being published on May 1st 2018. Once again it is the story of how we are all formed by our past experiences, and tells the story of Olivia. a young Scottish mother living in Switzerland, who thinks she has escaped her past. But one memorable winter the past catches up with her, and her carefully constructed life begins to fall apart.

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