Malcolm Edwards, who co-founded the Chiswick Book Festival in 2009 and published A Game of Thrones and Ian Rankin, has died aged 76. Tributes from his authors.

Malcolm Edwards, the publisher who co-founded the Chiswick Book Festival, has died at the age of 76. The festival published its tribute on Wednesday 7 October and said he died at the weekend.

He started the festival in 2009 with his wife, Jacks Thomas. It is held at St Michael and All Angels Church in Bedford Park, and ran its 18th edition from 9 to 14 September.

“There would have been no Chiswick Book Festival without Malcolm”

Torin Douglas, the festival’s director, said the couple got it off to a fast start. “It was Malcolm’s authors and Jacks’s energy that got the Festival off to a flying start and ensured it never looked back,” he said.

He said he had wanted to begin slowly. “Their idea of ‘slowly’ was Lady Antonia Fraser, Anthony Horowitz, Michael Frayn and Jacqueline Wilson, who all drew large and appreciative audiences to St Michael & All Angels Church.”

“Malcolm will be very much missed,” he added. “Our condolences to Jacks and their family.”

Forty years of bestsellers

The festival’s page reproduces in full a statement from his family. It sets out a career that took in some of the best-known books of the last half century:

  • Gollancz, from 1976. He rose to publishing director. In one month of 1984 he published J.G. Ballard’s Empire of the Sun, William Gibson’s Neuromancer and Robert Holdstock’s Mythago Wood.
  • HarperCollins, from late 1989. He published Michael Dobbs’s House of Cards novels and George R.R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones. His idea of issuing a novel in paperback parts became Stephen King’s The Green Mile in 1996, and he was named Editor of the Year at that year’s British Book Awards.
  • Orion, from 1998. He became managing director, then deputy chief executive and publisher in 2003. His authors there included Ian Rankin, Maeve Binchy, Harlan Coben, Kate Mosse, Michael Palin and Malala Yousafzai.
  • After 2019. He left Hachette that year and later published André Deutsch, then worked as a consultant.

Before publishing, he trained as a librarian and worked at Pinner Library. He was also a science fiction editor and critic, and his only published story, “After-Images”, won a British SF Award in 1983.

Several of the authors who paid tribute have also spoken at the Chiswick festival. Anthony Horowitz said Edwards had supported “some of my best work including The House of Silk and Magpie Murders”. Kate Mosse called him “a brilliant, quiet, exceptional man of publishing”.

Ian Rankin said: “I always think of Malcolm as a properly old-school publisher for whom people were as important as the books they wrote, read, sold or published.”

What it means for you

The festival he helped start is a non-profit community event. It raises money for St Michael and All Angels Church and three reading and arts charities: Read Easy Ealing, Koestler Arts and Read for Good. Its 2026 round-up says it has raised more than £170,000 for charities in 17 years.

His family’s statement says there will be a celebration of his life and career “for the trade” in due course. No public event in Chiswick has been announced. The festival’s own history page, “How the Festival began”, is linked from its tribute.

We covered this year’s festival, where Jacks Thomas returned as chair, in our September preview.