Peter Høeg was born in 1957 and followed various callings - dancer, actor, fencer, sailor, mountaineer - before he turned seriously to writing. He published his first novel, The History of Danish Dreams, in 1988, and was called 'the foremost writer of his generation' by Information magazine. His crime novel Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow received universal acclaim and was an international bestseller.
Martin Aitken has translated numerous novels from Norwegian and Danish. He has received the PEN America Translation Prize and the National Translation Award in Prose, and his work has been shortlisted for the International Booker Prize, the National Book Awards, and the Dublin Literary Award.