April 2021

Medical memoirs, a culinary call to action and the letters of a wartime pilot are among this month's alumni-authored literature.

1.

Author

Alan Addison

Degree English Literature
Book

Various

In the past few years, Alan Addison has become a prolific novelist with several titles under his belt including:

Working for Josh: A chance encounter with a young man at a bus stop takes JP Associates on a path that none could have expected, nor imagined - a path that leads them to question their motives and at times their existence, past and present. 

Working for Josh (Amazon)

Justifed Sinner: The day community worker Tod Peterson decided crime could force a change upon the Edinburgh society he lived and worked in was a day that would come to haunt him.

Justifed Sinner (Amazon)

Treaty of Union: The day retired Detective Inspector Bob James walked into the office of JP Associates and demanded his colleagues drop what they were doing, to investigate the finding of a body in Leith Fort - a body that Police Scotland wanted nothing to do with - was a day that would change them all.

Treaty of Union (Amazon)

You can also find out more on Alan's website.

2.

Author

James Owen Drife

Degree Medicine
Book

This Medical Life

Unparalleled in British medical history James Owen Drife charted his reactions to the medical world in which he worked and published them, initially in World Medicine and then the British Medical Journal (BMJ). This book is so (metimes painfully frank, at other times disturbing or very funny but always entertaining. It provides an important insight on the life and times of a doctor working in the NHS.

This Medical Life (Amazon)

3.

Author Danielle L. Eiseman
Degree

Carbon Management

Books

Our Changing Menu

Our Changing Menu unpacks the increasingly complex relationships between food and climate change. Whether you're a chef, baker, distiller, restaurateur, or someone who simply enjoys a good pizza or drink, it's time to come to terms with how climate change is affecting our diverse and interwoven food system.

The book offers an eye-opening journey through a complete menu of before-dinner drinks and salads; main courses and sides; and coffee and dessert. Along the way they examine the escalating changes occurring to the flavors of spices and teas, the yields of wheat, the vitamins in rice, and the price of vanilla. Their story is rounded out with a primer on the global food system, the causes and impacts of climate change, and what we can all do.  Danielle co-authored the book with Michael P. Hoffmann and Carrie Koplinka-Loehr.

Our Changing Menu (publisher's website)

4.

Author

Stasha Healy

Degree Literature - Junior Year Abroad
Books

Secret Connecticut: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure

Stasha brings to life Connecticut’s long history of intriguing people, places, and events in short vignettes that will surprise and fascinate even lifelong residents.

This is no dry doorstop of a book: Full of photos, Secret Connecticut tells 84 stories that will make readers say “I didn’t know that!” The book’s stories span the state, subject matter, and time periods - something for all readers and ages.

Secret Connecticut: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure (on Stasha's website)

Stasha's alumni profile - tracing her Scottish roots and life on a junior year abroad

5. 

Author Gaye Manwaring
Degree

PhD Biochemical Genetics

Books

Waiting in the Wings: Letters of a Pilot in World War II

The Second World War left no corner of Europe unaffected, and was to touch lives in every country. Young British librarian Len Manwaring was no exception; answering his country's call to arms, he would soon discover a life turned upside down when he enlisted in the Royal Air Force and saw a tour of duty which involved time serving in North America and South Africa as well as closer to home in a United Kingdom that was fighting the constant threat of invasion. Yet just as difficult for Len was the prospect of leaving behind Joan, the girl he loved, with whom he would correspond throughout the entirety of the war.

Now, in this special anthology of letters, airgraphs and other authentic materials from the time, Gaye Manwaring presents the remarkable story of her parents' extraordinary romance, set against the backdrop of an era-defining global conflict. Illustrated with many photographs from the 1940s, "Waiting in the Wings" is the story of how true love can endure in the most challenging of circumstances - even a war which saw Len and Joan separated not just by their duties in the armed services, but by the distance which lay between whole continents.

All royalties go to the Air Museum in Montrose. 

Waiting in the Wings: Letters of a Pilot in World War II (Amazon)

Submit your book

If you are a member of the alumni community and have recently published a book, we would be delighted to include it in the Alumni Bookshelf.  Email the editor, Brian Campbell, with the following information:

  • your name
  • degree details
  • book  details, including a link for further information

Email Brian Campbell

Please note

Books are added to the bookshelf in order of submission. All of the further information links listed are the external websites of the book publisher, the author, or the bookseller. The University of Edinburgh is not responsible for the content and functionality of these sites. We reserve the right to not publish all submissions we receive.