Neil Astley has been editor of Bloodaxe Books since founding the press after graduating from Newcastle University in 1978. He received an Eric Gregory Award for his poetry in 1982, and was given an honorary D.Litt by Newcastle University in 1995. He has published two poetry collections and two novels, The End of My Tether (Flambard, 2002; Scribner, 2003), shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award, and The Sheep Who Changed the World (Flambard, 2005), and several anthologies, notably the Staying Alive trilogy, and two collaborations with Pamela Robertson-Pearce, Soul Food (2007) and the DVD-book In Person (2008).