Grace Monroe

Grace Monroe is the pseudonym for the writing team of Maria Thomson and Linda Watson-Brown.Maria Thomson was born and brought up in Edinburgh. She graduated with a law Grace Monroe (aka Maria Thomson and Linda Watson-Brown) degree in her early 20s, and a year after qualifying, was made a partner in an Edinburgh law firm. She met her husband-to-be, Gordon, already a partner in a rival firm, before the couple formed a law firm together. They were seen as mavericks, due in part to their unique style and progressive marketing techniques. Their reputation as ‘rainmakers’, and as spearheads of the new style which clashed with how things were ‘supposed to be done’, caused considerable controversy within the legal community, leading to discipline actions against them and their company being struck off in 1995 for ‘administrative mistakes’.In response they raised a defamation action, which they won, resulting in compensation and an apology from the Law Society. Ironically Maria’s husband Gordon was at that time spokesperson for Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers, which name was later changed to Injured by the Law.Maria and her husband decided that they no longer wished to practice law, and with their children travelled the world for a year, settling briefly in Hawaii, before returning to Scotland.Maria has since then worked as a hypnotherapist, psychotherapist, stage hypnotist and fertility counsellor, amongst many things. Moving with her family to Kingussie, in the beautiful Monarch of the Glen country in the Scottish Highlands, has afforded Maria the chance to start the next chapter in her life, as a writer. Read our Maria Thomson interview.After ten years as a Politics lecturer in Scottish universities, Linda Watson-Brown began a journalistic career as a columnist at The Scotsman. She went on to write on a regular basis for the Daily Mail, Big Issue, Daily Record, Sunday Herald and Independent, amongst others, and also developed a career as a ghost-writer. Her best-selling ghost-written book, The Step Child, first published in 2006, has now been released in paperback, and remains a best-seller. She is now working on a screenplay of the book, as well as continuing with ghost-writing and fiction. She and her family live in the North-East of Scotland, in a converted steading, formerly a pig barn.In 2003, Maria and Linda met and became firm friends. They soon realised that they should put their talents and experiences together and write as a team.