Photo: Jane Mingay / AP Photo/TT (2005)
Sample of authors
Rendell, Ruth
The British crime writer Ruth Rendell was born in London as Ruth Barbara Graseman. Her mother was of Scandinavian origin and her father a former shipyard worker in Plymouth who was able to train as a technology and mathematics teacher as an adult. Ruth Rendell attended the County High School for Girls in Loughton, Essex. She was a feature writer and deputy editor at a number of local newspapers...
Literary figures
Mumtaz Hakim
Gender: Female
Her family come from Bangladesh, but she has grown up in London. She became a widow at a young age when her husband – a brutal petty gangster – was murdered in a gang fight, and since then she has lived alone with her teenage step-daughter Shazia. Even though Mumtaz Hakim is a Muslim, and thus wears a veil, she is employed as an assistant by private detective Lee Arnold. The two together are the p...