Nicola Upson was born in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, and read English at Downing College, Cambridge. She has worked in theatre and as a freelance journalist, and is the author of two non-fiction works, and the recipient of an Escalator Award from Arts Council England.

Since discovering the work of Golden Age author Josephine Tey/Gordon Daviot, she has developed a passion for the theatre and literature of the period, and an admiration for those who wrote and performed between the wars. Her research has included many conversations with people who remember the time and who knew Josephine Tey, including Sir John Gielgud and Margaret Harris, one of the design team ‘Motley‘.

Stanley and Elsie, was published in May 2019 by Duckworth Press, Sorry for the Dead in 2019 and The Dead of Winter in 2020, both by Faber & Faber. Nicola’s latest novel, Dear Little Corpses will be published by Faber & Faber in 2022.

She lives with her partner and splits her time between Cambridge and Cornwall.

Photograph of Nicola Upson courtesy of Julia Hedgecoe