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Carol McKay

Goodreads Author

Born

in Glasgow, The United Kingdom

Website

http://www.carolmckay.co.uk

Twitter

carolmckaywrite

Genre

Fiction, Memoir, Nonfiction

Influences

Janet Paisley; Janice Galloway; Anne Donovan; James Kelman; Jon McGreg ...more

Member Since

November 2012

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Out now, my crime novel White Spirit. Set in the Scottish Highlands, it introduces DI Allan MacIntyre, a good-looking 37-year-old who has to investigate the murder of a teenage boy at the same time as a series of minor explosions. 'a thrilling story... White Spirit excels in plot. The pacing is perfect.' (Arkbound)

Want a feelgood read about life after a pandemic? Incunabulum is for you. I promise you - the characters face their share of scary fights and ordeals, but this is a positive book, fast paced and with a happy ending, and isn't that exactly what we want right now? Incunabulum is epic storytelling about new life. Try it! And let me know what you think of it.

Leela Soma interviewed me about it for her blog, and you can read it here - h Out now, my crime novel White Spirit. Set in the Scottish Highlands, it introduces DI Allan MacIntyre, a good-looking 37-year-old who has to investigate the murder of a teenage boy at the same time as a series of minor explosions. 'a thrilling story... White Spirit excels in plot. The pacing is perfect.' (Arkbound)

Want a feelgood read about life after a pandemic? Incunabulum is for you. I promise you - the characters face their share of scary fights and ordeals, but this is a positive book, fast paced and with a happy ending, and isn't that exactly what we want right now? Incunabulum is epic storytelling about new life. Try it! And let me know what you think of it.

Leela Soma interviewed me about it for her blog, and you can read it here - https://leelasoma.wordpress.com/2020/...

My fiction is informed by people and places. Many of my stories stem from experiences within my hometown but I often find myself inspired by places I've visited. Sometimes my work is classified as urban realism; sometimes it asks the reader to grapple with the misfit in us all.

My short stories have been finding publication for twenty years since I took a Masters degree in Creative Writing at the Universities of Strathclyde and Glasgow. I'm very happy to have some of the early ones made available together in an e-book called 'Ordinary Domestic' published in March 2012 by The PotHole Press.

Also available on Amazon, in e-book format and good old fashioned ink and paper, is 'As I lay me down to sleep' which is the first volume of Eileen Munro's autobiography. I co-wrote this book with Eileen after meeting her when she was a student on one of the Open University creative writing modules which I taught between 2004 to 2018.

In 2010, I was diagnosed with a health condition called Addison's disease. It's an auto-immune condition in which the body attacks and destroys the outer layers of the adrenal glands. It's a fairly rare condition, so I got in touch with fifteen other Addison's people to produce an inspirational book on the subject. We've all written about our experience of what it's like to live with this life-changing condition, and this is now available on Kindle in the e-book called 'Second Chances: true stories of living with Addison's disease'.

Also available for Kindle - my e-book of Creative Writing Prompts to Feed the Imagination. I wrote this to answer the question I get asked most often, i.e. 'Where do you find ideas? I'd love to write but can't think of anything to write about.' This little guide gives lots of stimulating ideas for fiction, poetry and memoir writing and it also includes some straightforward advice on plotting and point of view.

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Carol McKay’s books

Average rating: 4.15 · 706 ratings · 40 reviews · 15 distinct works • Similar authors

	As I Lay Me Down to Sleep by Eileen Munro, Carol McKay (Goodreads Author) 4.12 avg rating — 624 ratings — published 2008 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Second chances: true stories of living with Addison's disease 4.24 avg rating — 45 ratings — published 2012 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Incunabulum 4.70 avg rating — 10 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	White Spirit 4.22 avg rating — 9 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Don't. Even. Ask. Too. Hot. by Kirstin Innes (Goodreads Author) (Editor), Chris Powici (Editor), Niall O'Gallagher (Editor) 4.20 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 2024	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction 2019: Scent by Matt Thomas, Duncan Abel, Carol McKay (Goodreads Author) really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 2019	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Creative Writing Prompts to Feed the Imagination 4.50 avg rating — 4 ratings — published 2012 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Ordinary Domestic it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 2 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Reading the Landscape liked it 3.00 avg rating — 1 rating	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Ordinary Domestic: Collected Short Stories 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings — published 2012	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Carol McKay…

12 posts
Carol McKay's Blog

Retire? Me?

When does a writer retire?

When do we stop feeling the urge, the need, to express ourselves?

Possibly never.

And so it is that I'm happy to have my small successes through the year.

Recent publications

In Spring 2025, I was delighted that my short story 'Flight' was published in the Aberdeen-based literary magazine Pushing Out The Boat. 'Flight' is a story about a doctor who grew up and studie Read more of this blog post »

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Published on September 09, 2025 04:14

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Carol’s Recent Updates

Carol McKay wrote a new blog post Retire? Me? When does a writer retire?When do we stop feeling the urge, the need, to express ourselves?Possibly never.And so it is that I'm happy to have my small Read more of this blog post »
Sep 09, 2025 06:15AM · like
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing In the Blink of an Eye by Ali Bacon (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This novel uses a variety of different narrators to build up an absorbing account of life in Edinburgh in the second half of the 19th century. Appropriate, really, to build the storyline via these ‘snapshots’ as the novel is about artists exploring t ...more
Jun 30, 2025 09:03AM · like · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing Invisible Schemes by John McGlade	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Dazzling Highly original in style and content. So, some chapters are like catalogue descriptions of housing schemes (aka 'estates'), and these are interspersed with an ongoing narrative about a gangland hardman and his private-school-educated nephew. ...more
Nov 01, 2024 08:41AM · like · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing The Silent House of Sleep by Allan Gaw (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This is a gripping and absorbing read. It's crime fiction, gruesome in places but also intriguing. The plot is described elsewhere, so I won't go into it here. But this is also very much a character-driven book. Dr Cuthbert, the pathologist, is reser ...more
Aug 08, 2024 06:40AM · 1 like · like · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing Living on an Island: Expressing the Earth by Norman Bissell (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
I thoroughly enjoyed this book, which is readable and absorbing from start to finish. It gives the reader a comprehensive account of the geopoetics movement through time in Scotland and far across the world. The section on 'What is Geopoetics?' bring ...more
Aug 04, 2024 05:29AM · like · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing Connective tissue by Eleanor Thom	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Utterly beautiful book. The parallel storylines/timeframes are compelling and absorbing - totally immersive. What a wonderful writer Eleanor Thom is. And well done, Taproot, for publishing it. This must surely be a future prizewinner?
Jul 19, 2024 08:20AM · like · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing The Sparkler by Alan Humm (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
The Sparkler is a work of fiction, rather than a factual biography, based on part of the life of Charles Dickens, and I have to say, it is a sparkling read. It’s glittering and luminous in terms of story, characterisation and writing style. Through A ...more
Apr 06, 2024 01:32AM · like · see review
Carol McKay made a comment on Christine’s review of The Sparkler " Hi Christine. I hope you don't mind me commenting. I disliked CD in the book for a while, too, but then something changed and I liked him again! I thi ...more "
Apr 06, 2024 01:29AM · see review
Carol McKay rated a book it was amazing The Sparkler by Alan Humm (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
The Sparkler is a work of fiction, rather than a factual biography, based on part of the life of Charles Dickens, and I have to say, it is a sparkling read. It’s glittering and luminous in terms of story, characterisation and writing style. Through A ...more
Mar 25, 2024 07:14AM · like · see review
Carol McKay is now following Julie Kennedy Author of Ma Mum & William Wordsworth
Feb 28, 2024 08:54AM · like

More of Carol's books…

Quotes by Carol McKay (?)

“I was once told that sometimes out of limitation comes our greatest strength.”
― Carol McKay, Second chances: true stories of living with Addison's disease

tags: strength

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“That first week after the crisis that led to my diagnosis, I had the chance to surround myself with family and friends, and to enjoy contact at a deeper emotional level than ever before. Sharing that closeness was almost worth almost-dying for.”
― Carol McKay, Second Chances: True stories of living with Addison's disease

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“It still amazes me how my mental attitude, my outlook, my plans, the energy I put into something, affects MY Addison’s disease. Or the other way round – how Addison’s affects everything else.”
― Carol McKay, Second Chances: True stories of living with Addison's disease

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