Damian Barr Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Damian Barr is a writer, journalist, and the host of his own Literary Salon.

He is known for his first novel You Will Be Safe Here as well as Maggie & Me, his story of making it through small town Scotland during the Thatcher years. The book won the Sunday Times Memoir of the Year and was made a Book of the Week by BBC Radio 4. Stonewall named Barr the Writer of the Year 2013. In 2024, he helped make it into a play that was put on by The National Theatre of Scotland.

Barr also hosts a Literary Salon at the Savoy. Guests include Bret Easton Ellis, Jojo Moyes, John Waters, James Frey, Polly Samson, David Nicholls, Alex Preston, Taiye Selasi, Colm Toibin, David Mitchell, and Naomi Alderman. He hosts events in conjunction with the British Council, Hay, the Man Booker, and the BBC National Short Story Award. He has also taught a Memoir Masterclass for the Guardian-UEA.

He has been a Columnist of the Year and has worked as a journalist for well over a decade. Barr has written for The Times as well as publications such as Telegraph, the Independent, Financial Times, Guardian, Granta, and Evening Standard.

Damian is the Literary Editor of Soho House magazine and a columnist for the Big Issue and High Life. He based his first book upon his Times column and it was released in 2005. Get It Together: A Guide to Surviving Your Quarterlife Crisis ended up being a bestseller.

He has co-written two plays for Radio 4 and has also written a short play for their Fact to Fiction slot. He has also appeared on Today, Broadcasting House, PM, and Midweek, and The Verb and has been a presenter on Front Row and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Damian says that his life is books and even presented his own books television show on the BBC called The Big Scottish Book Club.

Damian resides in Brighton by the sea along with his partner and a bunch of their ‘intensely demanding’ chickens.

You Will Be Safe Here is a 2019 novel by Damian Barr. This is a book that is set in South Africa in 1901 and now. When Sarah van der Watt and her son are removed from their farm and taken to the Bloemfontein Concentration Camp, the English promise that they will be safe there. But are they really? Find out in this book that was based off of true events.

At the height of the second Boer War, Sarah and her son Fred are forced from Mulberry Farm by British troops. But there’s no need to worry apparently, as they are taken to a concentration camp where the troops tell them they will be safe.

Fast forward to 2010, where Willem is a true outsider. His Ma and her boyfriend aim to change this and so take it upon themselves to send him to the New Dawn Safari Training Camp. That is a place where they make men out of boys, and just as with the concentration camp, Willem is promised that he will be safe there.

There are two different stories that take place in South Africa with two different characters. It shows not only a darker colonial history but the legacy of violence and the drive that we have to not just survive but love too. A pick of the year from many different respected publications, be sure to check this book from Damian Barr out so that you can follow along with every word.

The Two Roberts is a 2026 fictional novel by Damian Barr. His second work of fiction, this book introduces the artists/lovers/outsiders Robert MacBryde and Robert Colquhoun and their wild lives as they move through Glasgow in the thirties to London at war and the Fifties and more. It’s a book praised by Douglas Stuart, who says that it ‘Crackles with creative rebellion’.

The author was also able to curate an exhibition of their work for Charleston, which was toured around the United Kingdom. The Two Roberts was selected as a Best Book of the Year by places such as the BBC, The Herald, The Observer, and The Guardian.

Barr describes this book as a timely love-letter to these queer Scottish pioneers as well as a book that explores what it means to discover your voice as an artist and find love where it is forbidden. The art celebrities were art celebrities that lived as hard as they worked, dying when they were young and penniless but on the verge of a comeback. This is a book that Elif Shafak has called ‘immersive, intelligent, immensely sensual’.

The place is Scotland and the year is 1933. Bobby MacBryde has found that he is on his way. He has spent years grafting at the Lees Boot Factory and now he is finally on his way to his future at the Glasgow School of Art.

On the first day he will encounter Robert, a man that he gets along with instantly. Robert is quiet and has beautiful loose dark curls, and from the moment that they met he would never leave his side. It is a case of love at first sight.

They will spend the money that they have and the time that they have taking in Glasgow and experiencing every part of it with a ravenous hunger. The pair take in its botanical gardens, the Barras market, and more, all while feeding the flames of their own passion behind closed doors.

The world is so close to war, but they have a huge talent that will end up taking them to cities such as London, Paris, and Rome. Even as the bombs rain down, the two will become stars and even go on to host huge and wild parties with celebrity guests. But sometimes the brighter that you burn, the faster that you burn out.

This is an incredible story of art, obsession, love and more, and a love letter to two artists who attempted to change the world in their own way– and ended up paying a terrible price. Read Damian Barr’s The Two Roberts to follow along with every word.