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Lucy Siegle is the author of ‘Green Living in the Urban Jungle’ and contributing writer on ‘A Good Life’. From a strong journalistic background, she is a specialist in ecological and ethical lifestyle matters. As well as writing her weekly ‘Observer’ column, she is an environmental columnist for ‘Marie Claire’ and a regular contributor to ‘Grazia’, the ‘Guardian’, the ‘New Statesman’, ‘Elle’ and ‘New Consumer’ magazine, and a frequent commentator on television and radio.

Graydon Sheppard is a photographer, commercial and music video director, graphic designer, editor and writer. He has received two Cannes Lions, as well as a recent Juno nomination for his graphic design work on Feist’s latest album, Metals. Sheppard is the co-creator and co-writer of Sh*t Girls Say, as well as the director, editor and star.

Alina Simone is a Brooklyn-based author and singer. Her first book of essays, ‘You Must Go and Win’, was published in 2011. She has also written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, McSweeneys and BOMB Magazine.

Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, both left-wing journalists and politically radical, met in 1961 while working for magazines published by the same company. They married the next year and together created the Martin Beck crime series, famously writing alternate chapters at night after putting their children to bed. Wahloo died at the age of 49 just as their 10th book was going to press. Sjowall currently lives in Sweden and continues to work as a writer and translator.

MIRA STOUT’s internationally acclaimed first novel, One Thousand Chestnut Trees, was nominated for the IMPAC award, first runner up for the Shiva Naipaul Award and chosen for the New York Public Library ‘Books for the New Year’. Her long-awaited second novel, Moon Trees is soon to be published. Her first play, A Cool Dry Place was developed by The National Theatre Studio and by The Old Vic. She is developing two film projects, and lives in London.

Miranda Sawyer is an English journalist and broadcaster. Besides her features and radio criticism for the ‘Observer’, her writing has appeared in ‘GQ’, ‘Vogue’ and the ‘Guardian’. She is a regular arts critic in print, on television and on radio.

Alan Sillitoe was born in 1928 and left school at 14 to work in various factories. He began writing after four years in the RAF, and lived for six years in France and Spain. His first stories were printed in the ‘Nottingham Weekly Guardian’. In 1958 ‘Saturday Night and Sunday Morning’ was published and ‘The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner’, which won the Hawthornden prize for Literature, came out the following year. Both these books were made into films.

Mark Steel is a writer, presenter, comedian and champion of the left. His TV and radio series include The Mark Steel Solution, The Mark Steel Revolution and The Mark Steel Lectures. He has written for the Guardian and the Independent and is a regular on Radio 4’s Loose Ends and appears frequently on the television programme Mock the Week. His latest series of In Town was broadcast in April 2010, and is recommissioned for winter 2011.