Michael Thomas Rio Branco TURNBULL (1941-)

Born in Istanbul, Turkey in 1941, he was educated at the Abbey School, Fort Augustus on Loch Ness, the Universities of Cambridge and London, before studying Drawing and Painting at the Edinburgh College of Art. For most of his life he has been a teacher and further education lecturer in Communication and in Tourism. Recently he graduated PhD in Ecclesiastical History from the University of Edinburgh (2005).
He has been awarded two Scottish Arts Council Writers bursaries (1993, 1997), two Glenfiddich Living Scotland Awards (1986, 1991), and a Sir Winston Churchill Memorial Fellowship (1993). Other awards are from the Farmer Trust, the Strathmartine Trust and the Carnegie Trust.
His publications are principally imaginative non-fiction, with a strong emphasis on biography, local history, opera and religion:

Edinburgh Portraits (John Donald 1987) ISBN 0859761355 ; Buildings and Landmarks of Edinburgh (W & R Chambers 1989) ISBN 0550200517 ; Monuments and Statues of Edinburgh (W & R Chambers 1989) ; The Edinburgh Book of Quotations (B & W Publishing 1991) ISBN 0951515160 ; The Edinburgh Graveyard Guide (Saint Andrew Press 1991) ISBN 0715206559 ; St Martin of Tours, Tranent (Tranent: St Martin of Tours, 1991) [no ISBN number] ; Edinburgh Characters (Saint Andrew Press 1992) ISBN 0715206710 ; Joseph Hislop: gran tenore (Scolar Press 1992) ISBN 0859678938 opera, Scotland
Scotland: The Facts (W & R Chambers 1993) ISBN 0550118330 ; Cardinal Gordon Joseph Gray (Saint Andrew Press 1994) ISBN 0715206990 ; Edinburgh and Lothians Holy Corners (Saint Andrew Press 1996) ISBN 0715206893 ; Mary Garden (Scolar Press 1997) ISBN 1859282636 ; Edinburgh à la Carte (Scottish Cultural Press 1997) ISBN 1898218870 ; Saint Andrew: Scotland's Myth and Identity (Saint Andrew Press 1997) ISBN 0715207237 ; Scotland the Facts (Neil Wilson 1998) ISBN 1897784619 ;
Abbey Boys (corbie.com 2000) ISBN 0953900207 ; Curious Edinburgh (Sutton Publishing, 2005) ISBN 0750939494 ; St Peter’s Edinburgh (Edinburgh: St Peter’s, 2006) [no ISBN number] ; Rosslyn Chapel Revealed (Sutton Publishing Ltd, 2007) ISBN-10 0750944676; ISBN-13 9780750944670 published by The History Press in paperback 2009; Glasgow Graveyard Guide forthcoming (Scottish Cultural Press, 2009)