When I first came to Edinburgh, as a student, I was too intimidated by the National Library of Scotland (NLS) to go in. I walked past the big building on George IV several times. It felt like trying to pluck up the courage to enter CeCeBlooms—another Edinburgh institution full of stories! Eventually I did go in (to both). The Library had that familiar smell but everything else felt different—it was bigger, grander, much less welcoming than the libraries I’d known. In fact, it was forbidding. So I left.

Twenty years later, I’ve been made a Centenary Champion of the National Library of Scotland—along with the brilliant Val McDermid. It is a huge honour. Our appointment says so much about how the library has changed in that time. It’s the home of Scotland’s stories and gets a copy of every book published in the UK. It also houses maps, letters, diaries, images, films - even every copy of Kay’s Catalogue! It has priceless treasures, like the last letter from Mary Queen of Scots—which I got to see on the centenary launch day and which is soon touring to Perth Museum. But it also has treasures worth more than mere money—those Kay’s Catalogues tell the story of households like the one I grew up in, or aspired to.

I'm proud to stand with the resourceful and inspiring groups championing libraries and librarians in our communities. It was a joy to spend the day with those groups and with Val and with our National Librarian Amina Shah - the first woman to hold this post in the library’s long history. Congratulations to the whole team at NLS.

It’s going to be a big year for the library which is using this moment to celebrate all Scotland’s libraries - sharing treasures of all kinds, uplifting one another and the places they call home.

You can read more about the celebrations and our shared ambitions here.