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Tickets are now on sale for next month’s Spirit of Moray book festival.

Offering events suitable for all ages, the popular annual festival features best-selling Scottish crime writer James Oswald, and Ambrose Parry (pseudonym for the collaboration between best-selling author Chris Brookmyre and his wife, consultant anaesthetist Dr Marisa Haetzman).

Mark Beaumont, athlete, broadcaster, author and ambassador will speak about his latest cycling feats. Scotland’s amazing landscape and scenery is to be celebrated in an illustrated talk by Brigid Benson about the North Coast 500, while the bravery and tragedy of Scot Jane Haining is to be told by Mary Miller.

Author of Sixty Degrees North and The Un-Discovered Islands, Malachy Tallack returns to Elgin to discuss his most recent book, The Valley at the Centre of the World. Set in a small community in Shetland, it is a novel about belonging, inheritance and love, set against the rugged landscape of the islands.

There are also free sessions from the National Library of Scotland and the ever-popular Bookbug sessions for young children and their families.

Elgin Writers Group has sponsored a session by Rosemary Goring, who will be talking about the history of Scotland, taking a unique perspective on dramatic national events as well as ordinary life, as experienced by women down the centuries. It encompasses women from all stations of class and fame and notoriety, offering a tantalising view of what happened to them.

There are many more sessions for all to enjoy at the festival, which kicks off with cookery-writer-turned-novelist, Sue Lawrence, talking about her work and in particular her latest cookery book A Taste of Scotland’s Islands.

Tickets can be booked and purchased from Elgin Library, by telephone 01343 562623 or online. Visit www.moray.gov.uk/moraybookfestival for a full programme of events.