Betsy Tobin is a novelist, playwright and proud co-owner of INK@84 Bookshop in Islington, North London, though she was born and raised in the American Midwest. She resettled in the UK in 1989 and is the author of five books: Bone House, short-listed for the Commonwealth Prize and winner of a Herodotus Prize in America; The Bounce; Ice Land; Crimson China, a BBC Radio 4 Book At Bedtime and short-listed for the RNA’s Epic Romantic Novel of the Year; and Things We Couldn’t Explain. She also writes short fiction and plays and commercial fiction under the pen name Natalie Cox. In the past she’s taught creative writing for both Arvon and First Story, a fantastic charity that puts talented writers into secondary schools throughout the UK to foster confidence and creativity.