Elspeth Barker (16 November 1940 – 21 April 2022) was a Scottish novelist and journalist whose gothic novel O Caledonia became a cult classic.
[1][2] Elspeth Langlands was born in Edinburgh and raised in Drumtochty Castle, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, where her parents ran a prep school for boys.
It won four awards, including the Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize,[7] given by the Royal Society of Literature to the best regional novel published by an author from the United Kingdom.
Early coverage in the London Review of Books noted that the "enjoyable squib of a novel gives us Janet's voice, sharp and satirical as the Aberdeenshire winds, making its own weird and discomforting contribution to the portrayal of modern Scotland".
"[13] A 2023 review in The Economist noted that the heroine's "obstinate individuality is thrilling today, when teenagers' need to fit in seems ever more acute and their foibles are constantly displayed on social media.