Unfazed Sturgeon quit on her own terms

For those close friends who got a text from Nicola Sturgeon in the hours before she publicly announced her resignation as Scotland's first minister, it was the timing and not the fact of her departure that came as the shock.

- Libby Brooks

But Sturgeon is a woman who likes to craft her own narrative. For months, the first minister has been buffeted by decisions not of her making - the supreme court ruling that she cannot hold a second independence referendum without Westminster approval, the UK government blocking Holyrood's gender recognition bill - as domestic headwinds around the NHS, education and transport grew ever more unfavourable.

She leaves her party with no obvious successor and those same challenges unresolved - and herself, at the age of 52, with plenty of road ahead of her. The superlatives flooded in from supporters and opponents alike, describing Scotland's first female first minister, who has led her party to political dominance for nearly a decade, as "formidable", "unparalleled", "tireless".