Michael Marshall Smith (1965 – )

Born in Knutsford, Cheshire, he moved with his family at an early age to first Illinois and then Florida. At the age of seven he moved again, this time to South Africa, and then to Australia before eventually returning home to England in the early 70s.

He was educated at Chigwell School and King's College, Cambridge, where he studied Philosophy, Social and Political Science, and became involved with the Cambridge Footlights. He moved on to become a comedy writer and performer on the BBC Radio 4 series And Now, in Colour which has been described as a 'cult hit' ("which probably meant our parents and three other people listened in") and ran for three series.

His first published story was Spares, was released, the film rights to which have been purchased by Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks.

His latest novel is Straw Men, written under the shortened name "Michael Marshall". The change of name was originally due to the publishing of another book of the same name in 2001 by Martin J. Smith. However, Michael then decided to use the split to offer the possibility of publishing different genres of books under the two names - "modern day" novels as Michael Marshall, and horror/science fiction as Michael Marshall Smith (cf. Iain (M.) Banks).