Caroline Graham

Caroline Graham was born on 17 July 1931 in Warwickshire, England. She was a factory worker for three years after leaving school and from 1953-1955 served in the Royal Navy. She has also worked as an actress, stage manager and freelance radio broadcaster, and has studied with the Open University. in 1991 she obtained an MA in Theatre Studies at Birmingham University. She has been a full-time writer since 1971.

She writes for radio and television, between 1977 and 1982 writing five radio plays, episodes for Crossroads and an original situation comedy for television, The Common Lot.

Her first novel, Fire Dance, was published in 1982, followed by The Envy of the Stranger (1984), a thriller concerning a radio show host and a celebrity stalker which she also adapted for radio. Caroline Graham has also written two books for children: BMX, Star Rider (1985) and BMX'ers Battle It Out (1985).

The Killings at Badger's Drift (1987), the story of a tranquil English village disrupted by the murder of a kindly and well-liked spinster, was the first mystery novel in a series featuring Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby and Sergeant Troy, later adapted for television as the 'Midsomer Murders' series, starring John Nettles. The book won the 1989 Mystery Readers of America Macavity Award for the best first mystery novel. It was followed in 1989 by Death of a Hollow Man, also adapted for the 'Midsomer Murders' series. Five further titles featuring D.C.I. Barnaby have followed, the most recent of which is A Ghost in the Machine (2004).