Margaret Forster (born May 25, 1938) is a British author. She was born in Carlisle, England, read history at Somerville College, Oxford, and has worked as a novelist, biographer and freelance literary critic, contributing regularly to book programmes on television, to BBC Radio 4 and various newspapers and magazines.

She was the author of many successful novels, including Georgy Girl (filmed in 1966), Lady's Maid, Diary of an Ordinary Woman, Have the Men Had Enough? and The Memory Box, two memoirs, Hidden Lives and Precious Lives, and several acclaimed biographies, most recently Good Wives. She wrote "Rich Desserts and Captain's Thin", an account of the Carr's biscuit factory in Carlisle.

Precious Lives won the J. R. Ackerley Prize for Autobiography in 1999. Forster is married to the writer Hunter Davies and her daughter Caitlin is also an accomplished novelist.

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