William Fiennes

William John Fiennes FRSL (born 7 August 1970) is an English author best known for his memoirs The Snow Geese (2002) and The Music Room (2009). Early life and education Fiennes was born into the aristocratic Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes family and raised in 14th-century Broughton Castle in Oxfordshire, the youngest of five children of Nathaniel Fiennes, 21st Baron Saye and Sele (born 1920) and Mariette née Salisbury-Jones. His elder sister is the artist Susannah Fiennes and his maternal grandfather was soldier and courtier Guy Salisbury-Jones. One of William's brothers died in a road accident at the age of three before he was born, and another brother, Richard, developed epilepsy which caused aggression and mood swings (and eventually his death at the age of 41). Fiennes was educated at the Dragon School in Oxford, Eton College, and Oxford University, where he received both undergraduate and graduate degrees. Writing Fiennes' first book, The Snow Geese (2002), is his account of how he followed snow geese from Texas to their summer breeding grounds on Baffin Island, and a meditation on the idea of home. Mark Cocker reviewed it for The Guardian, writing: "The Snow Geese is the debut of a striking talent". It was shortlisted for the 2002 Samuel Johnson Prize and won the 2003 Hawthornden Prize, the 2003 Somerset Maugham Award and the 2003 Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award.