Barry Durham was born in Manchester in 1947. He was educated at North Manchester Grammar School and Salford Technical College where he studied Maths, Physics and Chemistry for a while before getting extremely bored with Applied Mathematics and dropping out. He was an insurance clerk for a number of years before trying his hand as a salesman, but his first love of writing kept getting him into trouble as he was often found scribbling down ideas for stories when he should have been working! After marrying his wife Barbara in 1968 the couple moved to the Preston area and Barry obtained the post of Junior Reporter on the Garstang Courier at the ripe old age of 23. The next 40-odd years saw him work for a number of newspapers and other publications in the Lancashire area, as well as a stint as a Press Officer and he had several short stories and freelance articles published. He has been a reporter, feature writer, sub-editor, Editor and Group Editor. As he approached his 60s he was invited to become an Associate Lecturer at The University of Central Lancashire in Preston where he taught Newspaper and Magazine Design to post graduate level until his final retirement a few years later. This gave him the opportunity to write full time (apart from tending his garden, that is!) At various times during his working life he has also been a marathon promoter, craft fair organizer and professional tarot card reader. He lives in the village of Chipping in Lancashire with his wife of more than 50 years; has two grown-up sons, a grown-up granddaughter and three grandsons.Barry has a fascination with witchcraft - especially the Lancashire Witches - and his first novel, a supernatural thriller called The Demdike Legacy was published in February 2012. He followed this up with Familiar Territory, set around a year before Demdike and introducing many of the characters for the first time. He followed these with Fell Creatures, Sweet Molly Alone, The Ill-starred Exile of John Smith, The Portal, and Root Causes. He has a collection of short stories under the title The Legend of Arthur King and Other Tales of the Supernatural and has just published (July 2021) a novel for older teenagers called The Last Werewolf.He also writes the Figaro The Cat Detective Stories for children.Read more about this authorRead less about this author