Tim Guest

Tim Guest, a contributor to Granta magazine whose first book was published by Granta Books, has died at the age of thirty-four following a suspected heart attack.

‘Orange People’, Guest’s memoir of his childhood spent at an ashram in rural Suffolk, was published in Granta 80: ‘The Group’. In 1978, Guest’s mother became a ‘sannyasin’, a follower of the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. A year later, at the age of four, Guest followed suit, adopting the practice of wearing ‘clothes the colour of the sun’ and taking the name of Yogesh, a Sanskrit word for God. ‘Orange People’ grew into his first book My Life in Orange, published in 2004. This was followed in 2007 by Second Lives, an exploration of the virtual worlds existing online, undertaken with the help of his avatar, Errol Mysterio.

Guest’s writing was irreverent, poignant and sensitive. As well as his contribution to Granta, he wrote for the Guardian, the Observer and the Telegraph. You can find out more about his books here.