A Place Like This

Find out more about my forthcoming book on Harris and Lewis


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Welcome to my web site

I’m Fiona Rintoul, a writer based in the Isle of Harris in Scotland. I'm the author of The Leipzig Affair, an award-winning novel set in the former East Germany, and Whisky Island, an exploration of the Isle of Islay and its superlative whisky distilleries. As well as an author, I'm a newspaper columnist, translator and content guru . I'm currently working on two new books based in the Outer Hebrides. One is a novel set in the 1970s, and the other is a non-fiction account of walks to abandoned settlements.

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Exploring the ‘Second World’ in Halle

It was a great pleasure to read from The Leipzig Affair at the beautiful Literaturhaus in Halle on 18 September as part of a conference on the 'Second World' in ...

Exploring the 'Second World' in Halle

Buy Whisky Island

With stunning images by Jura-based photographer Konrad Borkowski, Whisky Island captures the magic of the Islay whisky distilleries and the personality of the people who run them. It is currently out of print due to the collapse of Freight Books, but you can buy one of the remaining signed copies while we plan a new edition.

Whisky Island

Buy The Leipzig Affair

Set in East Germany in the dying days of the Cold War, The Leipzig Affair is a tale of love, betrayal and redemption. I drew on my own experiences of studying at the Karl-Marx-University in Leipzig to write it. The actor Douglas Henshall read the male part when the book was serialised on BBC R4's Book at Bedtime.

The Leipzig Affair

Take my tour of Leipzig

Visiting the fascinating city of Leipzig? With my Voicemap tour, you can join me on a journey into Leipzig's communist past. Walk with me through this vibrant city's mediaeval centre and discover how it looked in the 1980s under the East German regime and what it was like to live there then.

Leipzig Tour

Fiction & non-fiction

As a journalist turned author, I've written everything from experimental poetry to financial reports. My second novel, which is currently seeking a good home, is about an imaginary religion called Indigo and is set in a fictionalised version of Glasgow. I'm now working on a third novel and a non-fiction book about abandoned settlements in Harris and Lewis. The latter will be published by Birlinn.

MY BOOKS

Copywriting and training

A professional writer brings clarity and polish to any writing project. I’ve produced content for projects as diverse as an imagined history of the early days of fish farming and data-based reports on cross-border fund sales in the European single market. I also provide corporate writing training and have worked with some of the world’s leading companies.

Work With Me

Translation

I translate art, literary and business texts from French and German into English. In 2014, I published Outside Verdun, a new translation of German-Jewish writer Arnold Zweig’s epic novel of the first world war, Erziehung vor Verdun. Brought out to mark the hundredth anniversary of the start of hostilities, Outside Verdun introduced a new English-speaking audience to an unjustly neglected German literary classic.

TRANSLATION

Praise for The Leipzig Affair

“A dazzling debut novel. Rintoul pulls the reader through her story with craft and psychological precision, while trawling a satisfyingly long way into her characters' pasts and futures.”

The Scotsman

“I read this in one go, never quite sure who to trust or believe - the good or the bad. A psychologically complex story that brilliantly reflects disturbing times in a divided city and society. Its sharp, clever, sentences kept me hooked right to the end.”

Linda Leatherbarrow, author of Essential Kit

Highly Recommended

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Tongue porchetta beef ribs pork corned beef leberkas salami tri-tip short ribs flank boudin swine buffalo turkey. Hamburger kevin rump, ground round jerky buffalo picanha ball tip spare ribs burgdoggen pastrami. Leberkas chuck boudin, t-bone pig tongue jowl bresaola frankfurter. Alcatra jowl swine kielbasa rump turkey. Beef shank strip steak, doner ground round pork loin tail burgdoggen t-bone flank.

Luciana

Incredible Service

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Tongue porchetta beef ribs pork corned beef leberkas salami tri-tip short ribs flank boudin swine buffalo turkey. Hamburger kevin rump, ground round jerky buffalo picanha ball tip spare ribs burgdoggen pastrami. Leberkas chuck boudin, t-bone pig tongue jowl bresaola frankfurter. Alcatra jowl swine kielbasa rump turkey. Beef shank strip steak, doner ground round pork loin tail burgdoggen t-bone flank.

Luciana

Amazing!

Bacon ipsum dolor amet cupim.

Tongue porchetta beef ribs pork corned beef leberkas salami tri-tip short ribs flank boudin swine buffalo turkey. Hamburger kevin rump, ground round jerky buffalo picanha ball tip spare ribs burgdoggen pastrami. Leberkas chuck boudin, t-bone pig tongue jowl bresaola frankfurter. Alcatra jowl swine kielbasa rump turkey. Beef shank strip steak, doner ground round pork loin tail burgdoggen t-bone flank.

Luciana

Awesome!

Bacon ipsum dolor amet cupim.

Tongue porchetta beef ribs pork corned beef leberkas salami tri-tip short ribs flank boudin swine buffalo turkey. Hamburger kevin rump, ground round jerky buffalo picanha ball tip spare ribs burgdoggen pastrami. Leberkas chuck boudin, t-bone pig tongue jowl bresaola frankfurter. Alcatra jowl swine kielbasa rump turkey. Beef shank strip steak, doner ground round pork loin tail burgdoggen t-bone flank.

Luciana