Ian Hugh McAllister

Ian Hugh McAllister was born in Wallasey, Merseyside in November 1960. Married to Simone since 1982, they have one son, Stuart, who arrived as a bit of a surprise in 1993. They have lived in Dorset since 1985.

Ian has enjoyed a lifelong passion for aviation, especially airliners. A keen plane spotter, he fulfilled his childhood ambition by joining the UK Civil Aviation Authority in July 1980 as an Air Traffic Control Assistant. He was involved in training, line management and was a Flight Planning specialist. Prior to early retirement in 2014, his day (and night) job was Flight Information Service Officer, one of a close-knit team providing the on-demand "London Information" service to aircraft flying outside the UK airways system. He also trained as a Critical Incident Stress Management Defuser.

After a 30 year on and off research project about the life and times of his remarkable Grandmother Hilda James, Ian finally began writing in earnest during late 2011. The resulting book, Lost Olympics, was the long-awaited family history. Along the way he learned that Hilda was even more of a character than the determined old lady he had known as a child. He unearthed some dark and sometimes controversial family secrets that needed to be aired as part of the narrative.

In early 2015 Ian was appointed as the English Administrator at 10 Minute Novelists, an increasingly respected and busy Facebook community for writers at all levels of experience and aspirations. He was MC at their first live conference in Cincinnati, during August 2018.

Ian has always been an avid science fiction reader, preferring the so-called 'hard sci-fi' genre of books based in possible science over those dealing in pure fantasy. In July 2018 he released his first book in the genre, based on an original idea which had been kicking around in his head for twenty years.