James Meek was born in London in 1962 and grew up in Dundee. We Are Now Beginning Our Descent is his fourth novel. His previous books include Drivetime (1995) and The People's Act of Love (2005) which won the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, the SAC Book of the Year Award, was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and has been translated into more than twenty languages. He has published two collections of short stories, Last Orders (1992) and The Museum of Doubt (2000), which was shortlisted for a Macmillan Silver Pen award. He has worked as a journalist since 1985. He now lives in London. His reporting from Iraq and about Guantánamo Bay won a number of British and international awards. In the autumn of 2001 he reported for the Guardian from Afghanistan on the war against the Taliban and the liberation of Kabul.