Blair, Emma

(British, 1942– )

Iain Blair was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and educated there and in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He spent twenty years as an actor and wrote four thrillers under his own name before becoming Emma Blair, writer of sagas and romantic fiction. Emma Blair's novels are characterized by vividly realized settings and believable, strong heroines who are forced to make difficult decisions. Typical is The Daffodil Sea (1994), in which Roxanne Hawkins runs away from her rural Devon home to join a music hall double act. A number of Emma Blair's novels are set in Scotland, such as The Princess of Poor Street (1986), where the hero, Ken Blacklaws, fights his way out of poverty, and When Dreams Come True (1987), a romance set in a Glasgow tenement.

Tessa Barclay, Maeve Binchy  SA