Born in Edinburgh in 1859, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was raised by a mother who early on taught him to value his family's history and the actions of heroic men. During his preteen years in Jesuit school, Doyle was already an avid reader and storyteller. He published his first fiction in magazines while attending medical school at Edinburgh University. His writing includes seven full-length historical novels, numerous adventure stories and tales of terror, several works of science fiction, a few pamphlets and books on wars and the military and, later on in life, both fiction and nonfiction works focusing on Spiritualism.