Nellie Wildchild
The Glasgow Nellie Thompson had been born to was a city bled colourless by poverty and despair, and divided against itself by religion and class. A city where appearances meant more than the truth that might lie in a person's heart . . .
Nellie knew what it was like to be hungry and hopeless; to live a bitter lie with a man she hated. But still she held on to her dreams. Somehow she would leave those grey and violent streets behind. Somehow she would make her own life and her own world - even if she were forever denied the comfort of love.
Emma Blair was a pen name for Scottish actor and author Iain Blair, who began writing in his spare time and whose first novel, Where No Man Cries, was published in 1982.
During a writing career spanning three decades he produced some thirty novels, but his true identity remained a secret until 1998 when his novel Flower of Scotland was nominated for the RNA Romantic Novel of the Year award.
He was one of Britain's most popular authors and his books among the most borrowed from libraries.
Iain Blair died in July 2011.