Angus MacVicar

Who was Angus MacVicar?

Angus MacVicar was a Scottish author with a wide-ranging output. His greatest successes came in three separate genres: crime thrillers, juvenile science fiction, and autobiography. His early writing was interrupted by wartime service with the Royal Scots Fusiliers, hence most of his fiction appeared in the two decades following World War II.

MacVicar, whose father was a Presbyterian minister in the Church of Scotland, lived most of his life in the village of Southend. After attending the University of Glasgow he went on to work for the Campbeltown Courier.

Highlights of his many thrillers included the Edgar Wallace-style Greybreek and the smoothly readable The Killings On Kersivay, plus some books with pleasant golfing backgrounds.

His children's stories at their best would combine simple character sketches and exotic adventure with a non-obtrusive Christian morality. The excellent The Lost Planet series was extremely popular in books, radio and TV versions. In these fondly-remembered stories a pacifist theme came through strongly. Later titles such as Space Agent from The Lost Planet still have their fans; the series became less effective as it extended. There are six novels in "The Lost Planet" series: "The Lost Planet", "Return to the Lost Planet", "Secret of the Lost Planet", "Red Fire on the Lost Planet", "Peril on the Lost Planet" and "Space Agent from the Lost Planet".