Renowned climber and mountaineer, Jim Perrin is widely regarded to be the foremost writer on the subject of rock climbing. Born in Manchester Perrin has spent over forty years living in Wales. He has been described as ‘A remarkable writer...a sort of rucksack Thoreau...some of the finest travel writing ever’ by Jan Morris in The Guardian. A collection of travel essays, Travels with the Flea and Other Eccentric Journeys (In Pinn, 2002) have been described as ‘Hunter S Thompson meets Robert Byron’.

His other most famous books include Menlove (1985), a biography of John Menlove Edwards, an eminent British rock climber who wrote poetry based on his experiences and The Villain: The Life of Don Whillans (2005), a biography of the turbulent life of the British rock climber (1933-1985). Both biographies won Perrin the Boardman Tasker Award for Mountaineering Literature and the latter also won the Mountaineering History Award at Banff Mountain Festival 2005.

Perrin is The Guardian’s Country Diarist for Wales, contributes regular travel essays to the Daily Telegraph and writes monthly columns for Climber & TGO magazines. His latest publication is West: A Journey Through the Landscapes of Loss (Atlantic Books, 2010), which he describes as a psycho-geographical travel book on the nature of grief.