Lynn Michell
My seventeen books cross-cross genres, a publisher’s nightmare. They include Write From the Start, a writing scheme for primary schools, Shattered:Life with ME, a book recording the experiences of thirty people with severe Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and the authorised biography of super-realist painter Rosa Branson, and four novels. My debut novel, White Lies, set in Kenya during the Mau Mau uprising, was runner-up twice for the Robert Louis Stevenson award. This was followed by Run, Alice, Run, The Red Beach Hut and the climate conscious the water all around us. I am the director of Linen Press which I founded in Edinburgh eighteen years ago.
I have recently moved, after twelve years in southern France, to a remote croft in the Western Isles. I live in a timber-frame house with views of sea and islands, look after brown and black sheep, and grow flowers and veggies in a huge polytunnel.
Lynn’s books
Fiction
1993 Letters To My Semi-Detached Son: A Mother’s Story. The Women’s Press.
2011 White Lies. Linen Press.
2015 Run Alice, Run. Linen Press.
2017 The Red Beach Hut. Linen Press.
2023 the water all around us. Linen Press.
Memoir and Biography
2013 Shooting Stars Are The Flying Fish Of The Night. Lynn Michell & Stefan Gregory. Linen Press
‘We crossed the Atlantic in a blue boat called Scarlet.’
2021 Rosa Branson: A Portrait. Linen press
Non-Fiction
1987-1991 Write From The Start. Oliver & Boyd. Six illustrated pupils’ books and two teachers’ books to help children become competent writers. The books break away from traditional, narrow teaching methods and redefine writing as everything from a list to a letter to a project. The purpose is to make writing a varied challenge – and fun.
1990 Growing Up in Smoke. Pluto Press. A first account of children as passive smokers.
2003 Shattered: Life With ME. HarperCollins.
Anthologies
1997 A Stranger At My Table: Mothering Adolescents. (Ed) The Women’s Press.
2005 Wild On Her Blue Days. (Ed). AmberSand Press. An anthology of new writing.
2023 Tabua Rasa: Poetry by Women (Ed) Linen Press.
2024 Duo: Poetry by Women. (Ed) Linen Press.
2024 Skeins: an anthology of short stories by women. (Ed) Linen Press.
2025. Look Away Now. Poems of Hope and Despair by Women. (Ed) Linen Press.
Lynn’s articles, interviews and events.
- A Writer Lost and Found. The Asian Writer, 07.02.2011
https://theasianwriter.co.uk/tag/lynn-mitchell/ - Amazon profits are small publishers’ losses. The Guardian, 07.04.2011
https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2011/apr/07/amazon-profits-small-publisher-losses - My journey from Chronic Fatigue to Publisher. Thrive in Life, 15.09, 2011
https://www.thriveinlife.ca/index.php/my-journey-from-chronic-fatigue-to-publisher/ - Lynn Michell at Le Bookshop, Montpellier Sat. October 27th 4pm. Survive France, 28.10.2012
https://www.survivefrance.com/t/lynn-michell-at-le-bookshop-montpellier-sat-october-27th-4pm/5728 - An Atlantic crossing – always with ME in the background. 21.06.2013.
https://meassociation.org.uk/2013/06/an-atlantic-crossing-with-m-e-always-in-the-background-the-scotsman-21-june-2013/ - An Edinburgh family’s crossing of the Atlantic by yacht. The Scotsman, 21.06.2013
https://www.scotsman.com/whats-on/things-to-do/an-edinburgh-familys-crossing-of-the-atlantic-by-yacht-1570615 - Shooting Stars are the Flying Fish of the Night by Lynn Michell and Stefan Gregory. Literally PR. August 2013.
https://www.literallypr.com/public_relations/file/532.php - Exclusive Interview. Female First, 05.11.2013
https://www.femalefirst.co.uk/books/lynn-michell-366319.html - Run, Alice, Run. Chapterhouse Publishing, 23.11.2013
https://www.chapterhousepublishing.co.uk/run-alice-run-lynn-michell/ - Amazon, the greedy giant with small publishers in it’s grip. The Guardian, 02.02. 2015.
https://www.theguardian.com/profile/lynn-michell - Featured Friday: Meet Lynn Michell. THE FEM, June 20th 2016
https://thefemlitmagazine.wordpress.com/2015/06/26/featured-friday-meet-lynn-michell/ - Book Review: White Lies by Lynn Michell. Created To Read, 07.03.2017
https://createdtoread.com/book-review-white-lies-lynn-michell/ - The Red Beach Hut, The Writer’s Life, 21.11. 2017
https://kathleenjonesauthor.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-red-beach-hut-by-lynn-michell.html - Q&A | Lynn Michell, Founder & Director of Linen Press, Reading Women, 09.03.2018
https://www.readingwomenpodcast.com/blog/2018/03/09/qa-linen-press - Linen Press to publish Telling Stories. Catherine Chanter, 2021.
https://catherinechanter.co.uk/linen-press-to-publish-telling-stories-in-2022/ - The water all around us. Murder Underground Broke The Camel’s Back.
23.07.2023
https://murderundergroundbrokethecamel.wordpress.com/2023/08/23/the-water-all-around-us/ - Book Review: In a book about belonging – and not belonging – and loss. The Star, 24.10.2023
https://www.thestar.co.uk/arts-and-culture/books/book-review-in-a-book-about-belonging-and-not-belonging-and-loss-4383048 - Write On! Features: Writer & Publisher – A Symbiotic Relationship by Lynn Michell. Pen to Print. 05.04. 2024
https://pentoprint.org/write-on-features-writer-publisher-symbiotic-relationship-lynn-michell/ - The water all around us. Review by Jenny Garrod. D.U.R.A.
https://dura-dundee.org.uk/2023/09/26/the-water-all-around-us/ - Autumn Authors: The Water All Around Us with Lynn Michell. A K Bell Library, Perth and Kinross. 12.11.2024
https://www.perthshireboxoffice.com/event-categories/talk - My Weekend: Crofter/publisher Lynn Michell shares what she loves about her weekends in the Outer Hebrides. Press and Journal, 12.10. 2024.
https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/lifestyle/6588193/lynn-michell-crofter-publisher-hebrides-my-weekend/
