Fidra Books is a publisher and bookseller based in Edinburgh, and run by Malcolm and Vanessa Robertson.

We published our first book in 2005 and have grown steadily since then with around a dozen titles planned for the forthcoming year. In November 2007, we opened Edinburgh's only specialist children's bookshop.

Vanessa deals with the day-to-day running; supervises the selection of the stock for the bookshop; liases with customers, publishers and stockists of our titles; looks after our authors; organises events at the shop and oversees orders placed directly with Fidra Books. She also writes regularly (ish) on the Fidra Blog about books, bookselling and life as an independent publisher.

Malcolm is our technical whizz. He builds and looks after our website; oversees the production of our books and makes the numbers add up. Formerly a university physicist, Malcolm's also in charge of selecting the academic stock for the shop and has put together a range of science and maths books to excite all budding scientists.

Gill MacDonald is our bookshop manager,in charge of buying, author events and schools business as well as the day-to-day running of the bookshop. Edinburgh residents may remember her from her days as children’s manager at Ottakar’s on George Street, followed by a stint at Blackwell’s after Ottakar’s demise, as Children’s Buyer. Gill then went to work as part of the Council's Teen Titles team, promoting reading to schools and libraries.

The rest of the team include Polly and Jen, our bookshop assistants who can probably find the right book for any reader. There's also Magnus (aged 9) who's already a shrewd judge of publishers' proof copies, and Teaga (our Leonberger mountain dog) who's a 7 stone ball of fur and who already has a regular stream of fans visiting to give her a biscuit.