Neil Gunn was born in Dunbeath, Caithness in 1891, the seventh of nine children. He published short stories throughout the 1920s and his first novel The Grey Coast in 1926. He wrote several other novels, including Butcher's Broom (1934), The Silver Darlings (1941) and his autobiography, The Atom of Delight, in 1956. He worked for the Civil Service as a Customs and Excise officer before becoming a full-time writer in 1937. He died in 1973.