Ruary Mackenzie Dodds

In a major change of direction, away from his first three conventionally published books, Ruary has now published three more books. The first of the three is Luc's War. He was inspired to write the novel after meeting survivors of the Fall of France in May/June 1940, and discovering the activities of a close French relative. Quite apart from learning about the amazing events and the extraordinary heroism of many French people, Ruary found out that, in those six weeks, more French soldiers died fighting the German Army per week than in any week in the First World War, including the hell of Verdun. The book is a love story and a tribute to bravery. He has since written a sequel, Luc's War – Desert Gold. This book centres on the little-known fact that huge quantities of gold ingots were shipped across the Sahara Desert en route to Germany in WW2. Once again Ruary mixes fact with fiction, incorporating the real-life activities his relatives. A third Luc book will appear in due course.

The third book is Dorigen, a children's story. It tells the adventures of a young Bronze Age princess. She has lost her mother and is determined to keep her father, a master henge-builder, busy and happy. Together they travel from Eastland to Fortingall, a special place in the Highlands. On Dorigen's quest, she's aided by a Dream-Seer, but nothing is simple.

Ruary's three non-fiction books conventionally published are: Aberfeldy – The History of a Highland Community, and two books about his adventures with dragonflies, The Dragonfly Diaries and The Dragonfly-Friendly Gardener. He has appeared frequently on television and radio, working with Chris Packham, Kate Humble, Bill Oddie, Simon King, Lionel Kellaway, Kelvin Boot, John Craven, Paul Heiney, Charlie Dimmock and Lenny Henry. In June 2010 he was awarded BBC Springwatch’s ‘Dragonfly Geek’ award. Several articles have been published about him, including in BBC Wildlife Magazine and Scottish Field. He gives talks nationwide, including at the British Birdwatching Fair at Rutland Water. More details of Ruary’s dragonfly activities are on his website: www.ruarymackenziedodds.com

Ruary is a committed writer and speaker. Highly commended in the John Muir Short Story competition for his story To the Skelligs, he’s had a dozen short stories published in magazines, as well as poems in Outposts and Rialto. Ruary was educated at Gresham’s, Holt, Norfolk. He worked for Michelin for ten years, the last two of which he was Company Secretary of a subsidiary company. He later spent eighteen years training important foreign businesspeople to operate more effectively in English; but then a dragonfly landed on his shirt …