Siân Reynolds was born and educated in Cardiff, read Modern Languages at St Anne's College, Oxford, and has a doctorate in History from the University of Paris-VII, supervised by Michelle Perrot. She has taught in secondary schools, adult education, the Universities of Sussex and Edinburgh, and was Professor of French at the University of Stirling from 1990-2004. She has published books on both French and Scottish history, and translated works by leading French historians such as Fernand Braudel, as well as detective novels by Fred Vargas. She is a past president of the Association for the Study of Modern & Contemporary France, and is currently Chair of the Scottish Working People's History Trust.