The Sisters Mao is the new novel by UEA alumnus Gavin McCrea and is published by Scribe this week. Gavin was born in Dublin in 1978, and has since lived in Japan, Belgium, Italy, the UK, and Spain. He graduated from the MA in Creative Writing (Prose Fiction) at UEA in 2009 and gained his PhD in Creative and Critical Writing in 2013. His first novel Mrs Engels was published by Scribe in 2015 and was shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction and the Desmond Elliott Prize, and was longlisted for the the Guardian First Book Award and the Historical Writers Association Goldsboro Debut Crown. Gavin’s memoir Cells will be published by Scribe in 2022, and he has recently been commissioned by Hachette/John Murray to write a collection of essays on Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He is currently a Guest Lecturer in Literature at Bard College Berlin.