Leigh, Danny 1972–

PERSONAL: Born 1972, in Edinburgh, Scotland.

ADDRESSES: Home—Brighton, England. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Bloomsbury Publishing, 38 Soho Square, London W1D 3HB, England.

CAREER: Writer. Has worked as a musician and journalist.

AWARDS, HONORS: Dazed/Egg creative bursary for emerging novelists.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

The Greatest Gift, Faber & Faber (London, England), 2004.

The Monsters of Gramercy Park, Bloomsbury (New York, NY), 2005.

SIDELIGHTS: Danny Leigh's first novel to be published in the United States was The Monsters of Gramercy Park, a suspenseful story featuring a frustrated writer who hopes to pick up material for a bestselling book by interviewing a hardened criminal, who is also the author of a children's book. The writer, Lizbeth, began her writing career with a bestselling account of her near-fatal encounter with a serial killer. She was able to sustain her writing success for a while with a mystery series; but Lizbeth has grown bored, her sales are slumping, and she is tempted to escape into the heroin addiction she previously defeated. Wilson Velez is a prison inmate serving a life sentence for his leadership of the Sacred Incan Royals, an extremely violent street gang. By interviewing him and analyzing his life of crime—and his literary leanings—Lizbeth hopes to recreate the success of her first book. "The bulk of Leigh's chilly, finely etched narrative shows Wilson and Lizbeth trying to outmaneuver each other," commented a Kirkus Reviews contributor, who found Leigh's story "powerful." A Publishers Weekly reviewer found that while the story's elements are not particularly original, the author's "depictions of prison life are unusually intense" and deemed the book as a whole to be "a taut psychological thriller."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Kirkus Reviews, July 1, 2005, review of The Monsters of Gramercy Park, p. 703.

Publishers Weekly, June 27, 2005, review of The Monsters of Gramercy Park, p. 39.