Adrian Slatcher was born in Walsall in 1967, studied English at college, and gained an MA in novel writing from the University of Manchester. He has lived and worked in Manchester for the best part of 15 years, involved in various aspects of the local literary scene, which he often chronicles in a long-running blog The Art of Fiction (artoffiction.blogspot.com). He has written poetry, stories, and several novels, as well as music and drama. He co-founded the magazine, Lamport Court New Writing. Having been a computer programmer, website manager, and, currently, an advisor on new technologies for arts organisations, community groups and businesses, he has a longstanding interest in the interface between technology and writing; however his aesthetic centre remains in 20th century modernism and its offshoots, particularly American poetry and fiction; Robert Lowell and F. Scott Fitzgerald.