Frank Westerman (1964) is a Dutch writer and a former journalist. He studied tropical agricultural engineering at Wageningen University and worked as a news correspondent for de Volkskrant in Belgrade and NRC Handelsblad in Moscow. He is currently a full-time writer of non-fiction books, among which are The Republic of Grain (1999), Engineers of the Soul (2002), El Negro and Me (2004), Ararat (2007), Brother Mendel’s Perfect Horse (2011), Choke Valley (2013), A Word, A Word (2016), We, Hominids (2018), The Cosmic Comedy (2021) and Seven Animals Bite Back (May 2024). His books have been awarded the Dr. L. De Jong Prize for contemporary history and the Golden Owl Literature Prize among others, and shortlisted for awards including the AKO Literature Prize, the Eureka Prize for best science book, the Boardman Tasker Prize for Mountain Literature, the Kapuscinsky Prize for Literary Reportage and the Gaeta Prize for Travel Literature.
‘A perceptive, passionate writer, with a line in memorable observations.’ Sunday Telegraph