Alex C. Massie (13 March 1906–1977) was a Scottish international footballer of the 1920s and 1930s, who played mainly as a right-half. He was born in Possilpark, Glasgow.
Massie began his career with Shawfield Juniors, and later played for Petershill, Benburb, Ashfield, Partick Thistle, and Ayr United before joining Football League side Bury in 1926/27.
In 1928 he left Gigg Lane to play in the United States for Bethlehem Steel, and in 1930 he joined Irish side Dolphin. Later that year he returned to his native Scotland to join Heart of Midlothian. His performances at wing-half, and occasionally at inside-forward soon won him international recognition, with his first full Scotland international cap coming on 19 September 1931 against Ireland. Massie went on to be capped 18 times for Scotland, with his final game coming on 30 October 1937 against Wales, which was also the occasion of his only international goal. He also represented the Scottish League XI.
Massie moved to Aston Villa in December 1935, but was unable to prevent their first ever relegation at the end of the 1935–36 season.
Val McDermid (born 4 June 1955) is a Scottish crime writer, best known for a series of suspense novels starring her most famous creation, Dr. Tony Hill.
McDermid comes from Kirkcaldy, Fife, and was educated at St Hilda's College, Oxford, where she was the first student from a state school in Scotland (Kirkcaldy High School), and became President of the Junior Common Room. After graduation she became a journalist, and worked briefly as a dramatist. However, her first success as a novelist, Report for Murder: The First Lindsay Gordon Mystery, did not appear until 1987.
McDermid's notable characters are a lesbian journalist, Lindsay Gordon; a private investigator, Kate Brannigan; and a psychologist, Tony Hill, who suffers from sexual dysfunction. Her books mainly fall into three series: Lindsay Gordon, Kate Brannigan, and, beginning in 1995, the Tony Hill and Carol Jordan series, the first entry in which, The Mermaids Singing, won the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel of the Year. The Hill/Jordan series has been adapted for television under the name Wire in the Blood, starring Robson Green. McDermid states that Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird is her favourite novel.[citation needed]