Mark Blayney FRSA is a writer and performer based in Cardiff. He won the Somerset Maugham Prize for his novella Two Kinds of Silence and his second book, Conversations With Magic Stones, was described by John Bayley as "Remarkable... as good as some of the best of Elizabeth Bowen's, and praise does not go higher than that."

His work spans comedy, fiction and poetry. He is about to tour his new solo show, Be Your Own Life Coach ... with ABBA, and has also toured with the Lecture in Boney M Studies, a comedy extravaganza, at festivals including Wychwood and the Dinefwr Literature Festival.

He performs regularly with the Wordplay Cabaret, a smorgasbord (not as rude as it sounds) of noise, letters, numbers, static caravans and Lionel Richie songs.

"A perceptive storyteller of real promise..." Beryl Bainbridge