Luke Phillips

Luke Phillips has always been drawn to the darker corners of the natural world. Whether that fascination began as a young boy standing on the shores of Loch Ness, or while studying zoology at Liverpool John Moores University — where the Loch Ness Monster was name-dropped in the very first lecture he attended — is hard to say. Probably both.

From trekking through California in search of Bigfoot to camping in the Scottish Highlands on the trail of real-life big cat sightings, Luke has always been captivated by the creatures that haunt the edges of what we think we know about the world. The truth, he has come to believe, is often stranger — and far scarier — than fiction.

His Beast Series follows reluctant protagonist Thomas Walker through a series of terrifying encounters with creatures that science insists shouldn't exist. Shadow Beast, The Daughters of the Darkness, and Phantom Beast are available now, with Predatory Nature forthcoming. His standalone bigfoot thriller Rogue rounds out a body of work that sits squarely at the intersection of natural history and nightmare.

Luke is based in Kent, UK but his roles in conservation have taken him to Africa and the Americas, giving him a truly global view on the challenges facing the world's wildlife, real and imagined. He remains convinced the textbooks haven't accounted for everything that's out there.