Muriel Spark was born in Edinburgh in 1918. A poet, essayist, biographer and novelist, she won much international praise, including being twice shortlisted for the Booker Prize. The Times placed her eighth in its list of the Fifty Greatest British Writers Since 1945. She died in Tuscany in 2006. Ian Rankin graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1982. His novel, The Flood, was published in 1986. A year later came Knots & Crosses, his first novel to feature the detective John Rebus. The bestselling Rebus series has been translated into twenty-two languages and adapted for television.