Nina Allan – författare

‘The best account yet of the life of one of the great English-language writers of the last century.’ – The New World'A brave and moving book' - Adam Sisman, the Guardian‘Fascinating...very timely ...will introduce new readers to a writer Priest rightly calls one of the greatest of the 20th century.’ – Sunday TimesThis book is about J. G. Ballard. This book is also about death, love and time travel.J. G. Ballard possessed one of the most astonishing imaginations of our age, and he had an intense and turbulent history– an experience famously fictionalised in Empire of the Sun. Ballard’s novels are among the finest and most unusual fiction that has ever been published. Whether in the hyper-surrealism of High-Rise or the erotic violence of Crash, he upended the morality and reality of our world.As a young writer, it had been Ballard’s stories, most of all, that had helped cement Christopher Priest’s passion for science fiction. He set out to write a biography that would make people understand what he already knew: that J. G. Ballard wasn’t just a cult writer — he was one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century.In 2024, Christopher died. He had been diagnosed with prostate cancer, the same disease that killed J. G. Ballard — the man whose biography he’d spent his last months working on.When Nina and Christopher first met, they bonded over their love for Ballard’s writing. When it became clear that Christopher would not have time to finish this biography, Nina promised him that she would complete it. If the book began as a tribute from Priest to Ballard, it is now also a love story written by Nina for Christopher. With access to never-before-seen material, The Illuminated Man explores the history and themes of Ballard’s life and – with Ballardian strangeness – celebrates and mourns for those that are gone.

WINNER OF THE PRIX MEDICIS ETRANGER 2025Cath is a photographer hoping to go freelance, working in a record shop to pay the rent and eking out her time with her manager Steve. He thinks her photography is detective work, drawing attention to things that would otherwise pass unseen and maybe he's right . . .Starting work on her new project - photographing murder houses - she returns to the island where she grew up for the first time since she left for Glasgow when she was just eighteen. The Isle of Bute is embedded in her identity, the draughty house that overlooked the bay, the feeling of being nowhere, the memory of her childhood friend Shirley Craigie and the devastating familicide of her family by the father, John Craigie. Arriving at the Craigie house, Cath finds that it's occupied by Financial Analyst Alice Rahman. Her bid to escape the city lifestyle, the anxiety she felt in that world, led her to leave London and settle on the island. The strangeness of the situation brings them closer, leading them to reinvestigate the Craigie murder. Now, within the walls of the Craigie house, Cath can uncover the nefarious truths and curious nature of John Craigie: his hidden obsession with the work of Richard Dadd and the local myths of the fairy folk.The Good Neighbours is an enquiry into the unknowability of the past and our attempts to make events fit our need to interpret them; the fallibility of recollection; the power of myths in shaping human narratives. Nina Allan skilfully weaves the imagined and the real to create a magically haunting story of memory, obsession and the liminal spaces that our minds frequent to escape trauma.

An investigation of the human need to make connections, to find causes and effects, however fantastic, Conquest is the story of a disappearance, and of the mystery that follows.

Rachel's boyfriend Frank is different from other people. His strangeness is part of what she loves about him: his innocence, his intelligence, his passionate immersion in the music of JS Bach. As a coder, Frank sees patterns in everything, but as his theories slide further towards the irrational, Rachel becomes increasingly concerned for his wellbeing. There are people Frank knows online, people who share his view of the world and who insist he has a unique role to play. In spite of Rachel's fears for his safety, Frank is determined to meet them face to face.When Frank disappears, Rachel is forced to seek help in the form of Robin, a private detective who left the police force for reasons she will not reveal. Like Frank, Robin is obsessed with the music of Bach. Like Frank, she has unexplained connections with the criminal underworld of southeast London.An obscure science fiction story from the 1950s appears to offer clues to Frank's secret agenda, but not to where he is. As Robin and Rachel draw closer in their search for the truth, they are forced to ask themselves if Frank's obsession with an alien war, against all logic, might have a basis in fact.Nina Allan's new novel is a work of the greatest imaginative power, an investigation of the human need to make connections, to find causes and effects, however fantastic. Conquest is the story of a disappearance, and of the mystery that follows.

'Absolutely got me hooked' Val McDermidSHORTLISTED FOR BEST NOVEL AT THE BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION ASSOCIATION AWARDS 2026A Granite Silence is an exploration - a journey through time to a particular house, in a particular street, Urquhart Road, Aberdeen in 1934, where eight-year-old Helen Priestly lives with her mother and father.Among this long, grey corridor of four-storey tenements, a daunting expanse of granite, working families are squashed together like pickled herrings in their narrow flats. Here are Helen's neighbours: the Topps, the Josses, the Mitchells, the Gordons, the Donalds, the Coulls and the Hunts.Returning home from school for her midday meal, Helen is sent by her mother Agnes to buy a loaf from the bakery at the end of the street. Agnes never sees her daughter alive again.Nina Allan explores the aftermath of Helen's disappearance, turning a probing eye to the close-knit neighbourhood - where everyone knows everyone, at least by sight - and with subtlety and sympathy, explores the intricate layers of truth and falsehood that can coexist in one moment of history.Full of echoes, allusions and eerie diversions, A Granite Silence is an investigation into a notorious true crime case, but also a stylish, imaginative inquiry into who gets to tell a story, how it is told, and why.

A Granite Silence is an exploration - a journey through time to a particular house, in a particular street, Urquhart Road, Aberdeen in 1934, where eight-year-old Helen Priestly lives with her mother and father.Among this long, grey corridor of four-storey tenements, a daunting expanse of granite, working families are squashed together like pickled herrings in their narrow flats. Here are Helen's neighbours: the Topps, the Josses, the Mitchells, the Gordons, the Donalds, the Coulls and the Hunts.Returning home from school for her midday meal, Helen is sent by her mother Agnes to buy a loaf from the bakery at the end of the street. Agnes never sees her daughter alive again.Nina Allan explores the aftermath of Helen's disappearance, turning a probing eye to the close-knit neighbourhood - where everyone knows everyone, at least by sight - and with subtlety and sympathy, explores the intricate layers of truth and falsehood that can coexist in one moment of history.Full of echoes, allusions and eerie diversions, A Granite Silence is an investigation into a notorious true crime case, but also a stylish, imaginative inquiry into who gets to tell a story, how it is told, and why.

‘They didn’t see the house until they were practically on top of it. A single building emerging fromthe dark. It didn’t look welcoming. But the front door was open. The door was wide open.’Irongrove Lodge – a building with history; the very bricks and grounds imbued with the stories of those who have walked these corridors, lived in these rooms. These are the tales of an extraordinary house, a place that straddles our world and whatever lies beyond; a place that some are desperate to discover, and others to flee. At one time an asylum, at another a care home, sometimes simply a home.The residents of Irongrove Lodge will learn that this house will change them, that the stories told here never go away. Of all who enter, only some will leave.Multi-award-winning editor Jonathan Oliver has brought together five extraordinary writers to open the doors, revealing ghosts both past and present in a collection as intriguing as it is terrifying. Along with a linking narrative, this collection features five novellas by Nina Allan, Tade Thompson, K. J. Parker, Robert Shearman and Sarah Lotz.

A child is kidnapped with consequences that extend across worlds...A writer reaches into the past to discover the truth about a possible murder...Far away a young woman prepares for her mysterious future...In a future scarred by fracking and ecological collapse, Jenna Hoolman's world is dominated by illegal smartdog racing: greyhounds genetically modified with human DNA. When her young niece goes missing that world implodes...Christy's life is dominated by fear of her brother, a man she knows capable of monstrous acts and suspects of hiding even darker ones. Desperate to learn the truth she contacts Alex, who has his own demons to fight...And Maree, a young woman undertaking a journey that will change her world forever.

Selena and Julie are sisters. As children they were closest companions, but as they grow towards maturity, a rift develops between them.There are greater rifts, however. Julie goes missing at the age of seventeen. It will be twenty years before Selena sees her again. When Julie reappears, she tells Selena an incredible story about how she has spent time on another planet. Selena has an impossible choice to make: does she dismiss her sister as a damaged person, the victim of delusions, or believe her, and risk her own sanity in the process? Is Julie really who she says she is, and if she isn't, what does she have to gain by claiming her sister's identity?

Even time travel can’t unravel loveTime-travel is a way for writers to play with history and imagine different futures – for better, or worse.When romance is thrown into the mix, time-travel becomes a passionate tool, or heart-breaking weapon. A time agent in the 22nd century puts their whole mission at risk when they fall in love with the wrong person. No matter which part of history a man visits, he cannot not escape his ex. A woman is desperately in love with the time-space continuum, but it doesn’t love her back. As time passes and falls apart, a time-traveller must say goodbye to their soulmate.With stories from best-selling and award-winning authors such as Seanan McGuire, Alix E. Harrow and Nina Allan, this anthology gives a taste for the rich treasure trove of stories we can imagine with love, loss and reunion across time and space. Including stories by: Alix E. Harrow, Zen Cho, Seanan McGuire, Sarah Gailey, Jeffrey Ford, Nina Allan, Elizabeth Hand, Lavanya Lakshminarayan, Catherynne M. Valente, Sam J. Miller, Rowan Coleman, Margo Lanagan, Sameem Siddiqui, Theodora Goss, Carrie Vaughn, Ellen Klages

EWA CHAPLIN WASN'T AFRAID TO MAKE DOLLS THAT WEREN'T COMFORTING. SHE SEEMED TO KNOW THAT DOLLS ARE PEOPLE, JUST LIKE US. THE BEWITCHING NEW NOVEL FROM THE AWARD-WINNING GUARDIAN FRESH VOICES AUTHOR'A fantastic book' Andrew O'Hagan'Wholly original - worthy of a modern Grimm' Andrew Caldecott, author of Rotherweird'A masterful and multi-layered haunted toyshop of a novel' Tony White, author of The Fountain in the ForestStitch by perfect stitch, Andrew Garvie makes exquisite dolls in the finest antique style. Like him, they are diminutive, but graceful, unique and with surprising depths. Perhaps that's why he answers the enigmatic personal ad in his collector's magazine.Letter by letter, Bramber Winters reveals more of her strange, sheltered life in an institution on Bodmin Moor, and the terrible events that put her there as a child. Andrew knows what it is to be trapped; and as they knit closer together, he weaves a curious plan to rescue her.On his journey through the old towns of England he reads the fairytales of Ewa Chaplin - potent, eldritch stories which, like her lifelike dolls, pluck at the edges of reality and thread their way into his mind. When Andrew and Bramber meet at last, they will have a choice - to remain alone with their painful pasts or break free and, unlike their dolls, come to life.A love story of two very real, unusual people, The Dollmaker is also a novel rich with wonders: Andrew's quest and Bramber's letters unspool around the dark fables that give our familiar world an uncanny edge. It is this touch of magic that, like the blink of a doll's eyes, tricks our own . . .

Named as one of `50 Writers You Should Read Now' by The Guardian. From the award-winning author of The Rift, Nina Allan, The Silver Wind is a remarkable narrative exploring the nature of time itself.A powerful tale of time travel, time lost, time regained and time disrupted. In this remarkable narrative, watches and clocks become time machines, vehicles to explore alternate realities, the unreliability of memory and roads not taken.Martin and Dora Newland – sometimes siblings, sometimes lovers and sometimes friends, both subject to the tricks and turns of time and fate. Owen Andrews – watchmaker, time traveller, government agent. Their stories interlock and interweave like the perfectly honed cogs of a watch mechanism to reveal an unsettling world of missed opportunities, broken connections and personal losses.Award-winning author of The Rift and The Dollmaker, Nina Allan once again demonstrates that she is a storyteller at the height of her powers.

Named as one of '50 Writers You Should Read Now' by The Guardian. From the award-winning author of The Rift, Nina Allan, this early novel cements her reputation as one of the most interesting contemporary speculative fiction writers.Ruby tells the story of Ruby Castle told in snapshots and fleeting glimpses and secret histories, in tales repeated and reinvented by those who fall under the horror film actress's spell: her childhood sweetheart, an antiquarian bookseller with a passion for magical artifacts, the mistress of the poet who was once Castle's lover, a young girl in a future Russia who dreams of the stars. Worlds collide, and the boundaries between the real and the fantastic begin to break down. Is Ruby Castle a living person or a collective fantasy? By the time the final page of Ruby is turned, the world that Castle created through her films has become dangerously indistinguishable from our own.

A collection of short stories from the award-winning author of The Rift and The Dollmaker, Nina Allan. This compilation brings together rarely seen tales spanning the vast breadth of Allan's writing career for the first time. It also includes a brand-new introduction and one never-before-published story. Locus has described Nina as 'a subversive writer... playing with both the familiar protocols of genre and with the nature of the reading experience itself.' This is a stunning collection from one of the most astute and innovative voices writing today.

Dennis Beaumont drove an ambulance in World War One. He returns home to London, hoping to pick up his studies at Oxford and rediscover the love he once felt for his fiancee Lucy. But nothing is as it once was.