Cal Flyn

Cal Flyn is a Scottish author and journalist.[1]

Early life

Flyn was born in Inverness, Scotland. She attended Charleston Academy, a state secondary school.[2] As a child, she underwent orthopedic surgery to correct proximal femoral focal deficiency affecting the left leg.[3]

Flyn holds an MA in experimental psychology from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, and a NCTJ certificate in newspaper journalism from Lambeth College.[4][5]

Career

After graduation, Flyn worked as a reporter for The Sunday Times and The Daily Telegraph.[2] She left her job in 2012 to work at a dog-sledding kennels in Finnish Lapland.[6] Flyn is the deputy editor of the literary recommendations website Five Books[7]

She was made a MacDowell fellow in 2019.[8] In 2022, she was declared 'Young Writer of the Year' by The Sunday Times.[9]


She is the author of nonfiction books Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape (2022)[10] and Thicker Than Water: History, Secrets, and Guilt (2016),[11] and has published essays and articles in Granta, The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, The Sunday Times Magazine, and other publications.[12][13][14]

Works

Her first book, Thicker Than Water, tells the story of a distant relative, Angus McMillan, who is believed to have been one of the ringleaders of the Gippsland massacres of Gunaikurnai aboriginal people.[15][16][17] Her second book, Islands of Abandonment, is an exploration of places where nature is reclaiming lands once occupied by humans, such as Plymouth, Montserrat, and Chernobyl.[18][19]

Islands of Abandonment won the John Burroughs Medal for natural history writing.[20] It was also shortlisted for the 2021 Wainwright Prize for writing on global conservation,[21] the 2021 Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction, the Royal Society of Literature's Ondaatje Prize[22] and the British Academy Book Prize,[23] among others.

Flyn's third book The Savage Landscape is planned for publication in 2025.[24]

Personal life

Flyn lives in the Orkney Islands.[25]

Selected publications
  • Thicker Than Water: History, Secrets and Guilt: A Memoir (2016, William Collins: ISBN 978-0008126605)
  • Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape (2020, William Collins: ISBN 978-0008329761)

References
  1. Holgate, Andrew (23 January 2022). "The Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer Award shortlist: meet the young literary stars of their generation". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  2. "History, Secrets and Guilt: Cal Flyn, author of Thicker Than Water answers Booktopia's Ten Terrifying Questions". www.booktopia.com.au. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  3. Flyn, Cal (14 September 2014). "I go to the hospital to lengthen my leg. So far! So good!". The Sunday Times Magazine. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  4. "Cal Flyn". www.worldofbooks.com. World of Books. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  5. "Alumni Book Club: Cal Flyn". Lady Margaret Hall. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  6. Flyn, Cal (20 December 2013). "My winter on a husky farm in the Arctic Circle". The Telegraph Magazine. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  7. "Cal Flyn". Five Books. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  8. "Cal Flyn - Artist". MacDowell. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  9. "Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year: Cal Flyn". The Times. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  10. "Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape". HarperCollins Publishers. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  11. "Thicker Than Water: History, Secrets and Guilt: A Memoir". HarperCollins Publishers. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  12. "Cal Flyn contributor page". Granta. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  13. "Cal Flyn profile". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  14. Flyn, Cal (3 June 2021). "When Pollution Drives Evolution". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  15. Reid, Melanie (28 May 2016). "Books: Thicker Than Water — History, Secrets and Guilt: A Memoir by Cal Flyn". The Times. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  16. Lowry, Elizabeth (2 June 2016). "Thicker Than Water by Cal Flyn review – my ancestor the murderer". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  17. O'Mahony, Ciaran (7 March 2019). "The Scottish explorer who became the butcher of Gippsland". The Guardian. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
  18. Jamie, Kathleen (20 January 2021). "How nature reclaims the places humans have abandoned". www.newstatesman.com. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  19. McDonald, Sally (16 March 2021). "Wild and abandoned: Writer Cal Flyn charts her journey to the world's disaster zones and ghost towns". The Sunday Post. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  20. "2022 AWARD WINNERS:". John Burroughs Association. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  21. "2021 Shortlist Announcement". Wainwright Prize. 4 August 2021. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  22. "RSL Ondaatje Prize 2022 Shortlist Announced". Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  23. "Shortlist announced for the British Academy Book Prize for Global Cultural Understanding 2021". Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  24. "William Collins scoops new book by Islands of Abandonment author Flyn". The Bookseller. Retrieved 9 October 2023.
  25. Jana, Rosalind. "Author Cal Flyn on the Landscapes Left Behind". Retrieved 13 December 2022.
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