Andrew Cartmel was born in South West London, where he lives today. He grew up in Canada and returned to the UK to complete his education, such as it is (Andrew attended Queen Mary University and did postgraduate studies at the University of Kent in Canterbury).

A lifelong desire to become a professional writer initially earned Andrew some television script commissions and resulted in him being hired as the script editor on Doctor Who, in the days when that role at the BBC was virtually the same as a show runner.

He served for three seasons on Doctor Who, a highly influential run which has become memorialised as the ‘Cartmel Masterplan’, before moving on to script edit a season of Casualty and then writing for and script editing Dark Knight at Channel Five.

Other television commissions include scripts for Torchwood and Midsomer Murders.

He has written novels, toured as a stand-up comedian, written plays for the stage which have been performed in London (End of the Night, Under the Eagle, and his new comedy Screwball) and also written a number of graphic novels.

Andrew writes extensively about jazz for the website London Jazz News.

He is currently collaborating with Ben Aaronovitch on the highly successful Rivers of London comic franchise.

But his primary focus is his series of crime novels about the Vinyl Detective, a jazz-loving record collector turned sleuth; and the Paperback Sleuth series.

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