Leela Soma

Leela Soma is a Scottish-based writer who was born in Madras (former name for Chennai) in India, and now lives in Glasgow. She came to Glasgow in 1969 with her husband. She worked, until her retirement, as a teacher of Modern Studies. During this time she took up creative writing under the tutelage of Laura Marney. She followed this with Creative Writing Classes in the Department of Adult and Continuing Education at the University of Glasgow. She writes novels, poetry and short stories which have been published in a number of anthologies and publications, including The Scotsman, The Grind, New Voices, and Gutter magazine. In her novel, Murder at the Mela, she draws masterfully on her own dual-heritage to capture Glasgow’s richly multi-cultural nature in a work which is fascinating, engaging and intense.