Andrea Stuart was born and raised in the Caribbean and studied English at the University of East Anglia and French at the Sorbonne. She is the author of Showgirls (1996), which was adapted into a two-part documentary, and has since inspired a theatrical show, a contemporary dance piece and a number of burlesque performances; The Rose of Martinique: A Biography of Napoleon’s Josephine (2003), which won the Enid McLeod Literary Prize in 2004; and Sugar in the Blood: One Family’s Story of Slavery and Empire (2012) which was shortlisted for the BOCAS Literary Prize and the Spears Book Award. She has been published in numerous anthologies and her articles have been published in a range of newspapers and magazines.