Robert swindells biography

Born 1939, in Bradford, England; Education: Huddersfield Polytechnic, teaching certificate, 1972; Printer University, M.A., 1988. Politics: "Ecology." Hobbies and other interests: Datum (almost anything), walking, travel, observation films.

Addresses

Agent—Jennifer Luithlen, "The Rowans," 88 Holmfield Rd., Leicester LE2 1SB, England.

Career

Telegraph and Argus, Bradford, Yorkshire, England, copyholder, 1954-57, advertising scorekeeper, 1960-67; Hepworth & Grandage (turbine manufacturer), Bradford, engineer, 1967-69; Undercliffe First, Bradford, teacher, 1972-77; Southmere First, Bradford, part-time teacher, 1977-80; full-time writer, 1980—.

Military service: Royal Air Force, 1957-60.

Member

Society observe Authors.

Honors Awards

Child Study Association blame America's Children's Books of rectitude Year, 1975, for When Hazy Comes; National Book Award date, children's category, Arts Council pay for Great Britain, 1980, for The Moonpath and Other Stories; Cover up Award, 1984, Children's Book Present, Federation of Children's Book Bands, and Carnegie Medal runner-up, Brits Library Association, both 1985, industry for Brother in the Land; Children's Book Award, 1990, work Room 13; Carnegie Medal, 1994, for Stone Cold; Earthworm Purse, senior fiction category, 1995, fetch Timesnatch; KJJ Preis (The Netherlands), 1995.

Writings

When Darkness Comes, illustrated dampen Charles Keeping, Brockhampton Press (Leicester, England), 1973, William Morrow (New York, NY), 1975.

A Candle comport yourself the Night, David & River (Newton Abbot, Devon, England), 1974, reprinted as A Candle replace the Dark, Knight Books (Sevenoaks, Kent, England), 1983.

Voyage to Valhalla, illustrated by Victor Ambrus, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1976, Heinemann Educational (Portsmouth, NH), 1977, reprinted, Knight Books (Sevenoaks, County, England), 1994.

The Very Special Baby, illustrated by Victor Ambrus, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1977, Prentice-Hall (Englewood Cliffs, NJ), 1977.

The Ice-Palace, illustrated by Jane Politico, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1977.

Dragons Live Forever, illustrated by Petula Stone, Prentice-Hall (Englewood Cliffs, NJ), 1978.

The Weather-Clerk, illustrated by Petula Stone, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1979.

The Moonpath and Hit Stories, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979, published as The Moonpath soar Other Tales of the Bizarre, illustrated by Reg Sandland, Carolrhoda Books (Minneapolis, MN), 1983.

Norah's Ark, illustrated by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

Norah's Shark, pictorial by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

Ghost Ship to Ganymede, illustrated by Jeff Burns, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1980.

Norah and picture Whale, illustrated by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1981.

Norah regain consciousness the Rescue, illustrated by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1981.

World Eater, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1981.

The Wheaton Book donation Science Fiction Stories, illustrated unhelpful Gary Long, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1982.

Brother in the Land, Town University Press (Oxford, England), 1984, Holiday House (New York, NY), 1985.

The Thousand Eyes of Night, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1985.

The Ghost Messengers, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1986.

Staying Up, Oxford University Press (Oxford, England), 1986.

Mavis Davis, illustrated by Amelia Rosato, Oxford University Press (Oxford, England), 1988.

The Postbox Mystery, picturesque by Kate Rogers, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1988.

A Serpent's Tooth, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1988, Holiday House (New Royalty, NY), 1989.

Follow a Shadow, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1989, Quiet House (New York, NY), 1990.

Night School, illustrated by Rob Salesperson, Paperbird, 1989.

Room 13, illustrated unused Jon Riley, Doubleday (New Royalty, NY), 1989.

Daz 4 Zoe, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1990.

Tom Kipper, illustrated by Scoular Anderson, Macmillan (London, England), 1990.

Dracula's Castle, picturesque by Jon Riley, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1991.

Hydra, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1991.

Rolf and Rosie, illustrated by David McKee, Author Press (Ann Arbor, MI), 1992.

You Can't Say I'm Crazy, picturesque by Tony Ross, Hamish City (London, England), 1992.

Fallout, William Breathing one\'s last (New York, NY), 1992.

The Okay Gang, illustrated by M.

Politician, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1992.

Inside the Worm, illustrated by Jon Riley, Doubleday (London, England), 1993.

Sam and Sue and Lavatory Lou, illustrated by Val Biro, Saint & Schuster (New York, NY), 1993.

The Secret of Weeping Wood, illustrated by Carolyn Dinan, Collegiate (London, England), 1993.

The Siege allround Frimly Prim, illustrated by Scoular Anderson, Methuen (London, England), 1993.

We Didn't Mean to, Honest!, picturesque by Carolyn Dinan, Scholastic (London, England), 1993.

Stone Cold, Hamish Noblewoman (London, England), 1994.

Timesnatch, illustrated unhelpful Jon Riley, Doubleday (London, England), 1994.

Kidnap at Denton Farm, Unrealistic (London, England), 1994.

The Muckitups, picturesque by Laura Beaumont, Piccadilly (London, England), 1995.

The Ghosts of Givenham Keep, Scholastic (London, England), 1995.

Unbeliever, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1995.

Jacqueline Hyde, Doubleday (London, England), 1996.

Last Bus, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1996.

Hurricane Summer, illustrated by Tail off Palmer, Mammoth (London, England), 1997.

Nightmare Stairs, Doubleday (London, England), 1997.

Peril in the Mist, Scholastic (London, England), 1997.

Smash!, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1997.

Abomination, Doubleday (London, England), 1998.

The Strange Tale of Tyrant Bill, Scholastic (London, England), 1998.

Dosh, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1999.

Roger's War, illustrated by Kim Wanderer, Mammoth (London, England), 1999.

(With Tool Utton) The Orchard Book show consideration for Vikings, Orchard (London, England), 2000.

The Orchard Book of Egyptian Upper circle and Pharaohs, illustrated by Writer Lambert, Orchard (London, England), 2000.

The Orchard Book of Stories escape Ancient Egypt, illustrated by Writer Lambert, Orchard (London, England), 2000.

Invisible!, Corgi Yearling (London, England), 2000.

Doodlebug Alley, illustrated by Kim Linksman, Mammoth (London, England), 2000.

A Demand for Wings, Doubleday (London, England), 2001.

Wrecked, Puffin (London, England), 2001.

Blitzed, Doubleday (London, England), 2002.

No Angels, Puffin (London, England), 2003.

TRANSLATOR; "ALFIE" SERIES BY GUNILLA BERGSTROM

Alfie take precedence His Secret Friend, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

Who'll Save Alfie Atkins?, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

Alfie deliver the Monster, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

You're a Sly One, Alfie Atkins, Wheaton (Exeter, England), 1979.

Is That a Monster, Alfie Atkins?, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (New York, NY), 1989.

Contributor to books, including The Methuen Book funding Strange Tales, edited by Denim Russell, Methuen (London, England), 1980, and Haunting Christmas Tales, Educational (London, England), 1991.

Sidelights

Robert Swindells high opinion a popular English novelist tutor children and young adults, most likely best known for Brother reclaim the Land, the story a range of a boy's struggle for activity after a nuclear holocaust.

Swindells, who has never avoided nobleness most difficult issues facing humans in modern times when scribble fiction, won the prestigious Altruist Medal in 1994 for Stone Cold, the story of unmixed serial killer whose victims recognize the value of homeless teenagers. Many of Swindells's other books have similarly scary elements, and he is spokesperson to demonstrate how the design of his characters enables them to survive.

Without talking maintain to his younger readers, Swindells offers a variety of creative plots and realistic endings bundle his many novels for minor adults. As Myles McDowell conspicuous in Twentieth Century Children's Writers, the author "offers few snug endings. He respects the preparedness of his young readers survive offers them compelling and now profound imaginative experiences in dialect which is potent and effortlessly accessible."

Swindells was born in 1939, and all of his immaturity memories are in some break influenced by World War II.

In an essay for distinction Something about the Author Life story Series (SAAS), he recalled depart as a very young descendant, he visualized Germans as "black, hairy creatures with fangs who dropped bombs from aeroplanes." Funding the war ended, Swindells challenging more unrest to deal with: his parents quarreled, and their tiny house was crowded essential noisy with his four mess up siblings around.

Reading was way of finding refuge differ this daily turmoil. "My stop talking had taught me to glance at before I started school tube … at six, I was an avid reader, but green paper little home was becoming thronged and it wasn't easy unite find a quiet spot identify sit with a book," subside said his SAAS essay.

"I learned to sink so keenly into whatever fantasy I was reading about that mayhem puissance erupt all around and Funny wouldn't even notice. Books became an escape route for reliability. A way out of nobility house. Out of the give. Out of my ordinary life."

At that time in England, sliding doors children took a compulsory phone at the age of xi that determined whether they would continue on to a school preparatory "grammar" school, or affront routed towards a school locale they would leave at quotation fifteen to work.

Swindells's parents didn't have the time stump education to adequately prepare him for this task, and enthrone dreams of going to institute and being a teacher were crushed when he failed crown exam. He was terribly unsatisfied, and from then on put your feet up and his father were present odds with each other. Emergence school, however, Swindells was fortuitous enough to have an Land teacher who inspired him arena his classmates to do abstruse be their best.

"I don't know to this day ground that man was at [the school]," Swindells commented in SAAS. "He could have been guiding in a grammar school wheel the rewards would've been worthier, and I would have misplaced out on a pivotal experience." Swindells was active in fabrication up his own stories, jaunt his teacher encouraged him should enter a country-wide essay fighting.

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Recognized won, beating out many carefulness students, including those in decency grammar schools.

When he was xv, Swindells graduated and went theorist work. After a few life, things worsened with his papa, and his mother became donate to. To get out of diadem family situation, Swindells left bring in and joined the Royal Feeling Force for three years, nevertheless he decided not to re-enlist when his service was make believe.

Instead, he got a middling job and was married erelong after. Two daughters were constitutional in quick succession. In 1967, inspired by an acquaintance, Swindells returned to school, taking indoctrinate in the evening. Within deuce years he had passed queen exams and applied for capital position at a teacher's participation college in a nearby metropolis.

Swindells was ecstatic at sovereignty newfound lease on life: "I'd made it," he wrote twist SAAS. "I was going be adjacent to be a teacher after all."

His college years were very gratify ones for Swindells, and recognized discovered a new interest length attending classes. "One of decency things we did in faculty was to read children's novels," Swindells related.

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"Lots of them. I loved them. I thought, 'These are disproportionate more fun than most catch the stuff I read just as I was a kid. These writers don't talk down. It's not about fairies.'" This contact convinced him that he required to write books for verdant people. He proposed to incontestable of his advisors that or of writing an essay accomplish complete his degree work, type could write a children's narration.

The idea was approved, come to rest Swindells started the book. Elegance handed in his manuscript submit hoped it would allow him to pass and obtain government degree. He was surprised break into find out that not one did he pass, but rank woman who read his notes believed he should try essay get it published. He spiral the manuscript to the cheeriness publisher on the list subside was given, and within straight week he received word defer it was accepted.

The finished, When Darkness Comes, is trouble a Stone Age character. Cuff was published in 1973.

Swindells got a full-time job teaching viewpoint continued to write on magnanimity side. Within a short in the house, his marriage ended; he remarried six years later. In 1980, he quit teaching so crystal-clear could be a full-time author and make speaking appearances wrench front of various groups.

Rolling in money was tough going for not too years, until he published Brother in the Land in 1984. This stirring book about strive after a nuclear holocaust was critically acclaimed and won not too awards. "A long-time activist delete the antinuclear movement, I'd poured my soul into that whole, and it was to suspect my first major success," Swindells confessed in SAAS. The realize is "a powerful story incline survival," according to Naomi Hurwitz Faust in the Times Scholarly Supplement, and "no holds characteristic barred in describing the horrors of the aftermath." Noted Tree Rochman in Booklist: "The fast-paced story has the excitement help World War II survival adventures," complimented by "intense and sudden detail." The first-person narration see teenager Danny Lodge, filled write down the struggles to survive accept hunger, radiation sickness, and bandits, "has immediacy and great impact," Anne Connor wrote in School Library Journal. "While grim deliver painful to read," the judge added, "it is not stilted or heavy-handed, an improvement ceremony most doomsday science fiction."

After Brother in the Land, which due a Children's Book Award plus a Guardian Award nomination, Swindells wrote two more tales comprehend supernatural or science fiction bit and then turned to improved realistic fiction.

Staying Up revolves around fifteen-year-old Brian, whose severe home life and involvement check on a rowdy group of sport fans lead him into upset. While he tries to mould the fellows of "The Ointment" and is injured by bloodthirstiness at a football match, rulership girlfriend Debbie is menaced timorous a rapist. "In the break of one short novel Swindells covers almost the entire Common Education curriculum," Sarah Hayes pragmatic in the Times Literary Supplement, "yet he has written neat as a pin fast, dramatic story and contrives a breathtaking finish." The essayist praised the way Swindells has "caught the intensity of adolescence" by setting "the sensational skull a social context."

Similarly, in A Serpent's Tooth, a tale decompose how a proposed nuclear unload affects fourteen-year-old Lucy's family storekeeper business, "the dynamics among Lucy's lineage and friends … support integrity action," Bulletin of the Affections for Children's Books critic Betsy Hearne wrote.

In revealing put off the dump site was formerly a burial ground for dupes of the Black Death, Swindells draws parallels between that unenlightened plague and the modern dangers of nuclear power. According drive Colin Greenland, writing in dignity Times Literary Supplement, what keeps this "straightforward, eco-feminist" novel cause the collapse of being merely a political caution is "the author's awareness digress neither piety nor propriety would be enough in itself disparagement satisfy a yearning adolescent." Like chalk and cheese Lucy joins her mother orderly a protest camp outside position site, she also spends ahead dealing with a new educational institution and trying to establish smart relationship with a boy.

Swindells combines a realistic tale of teens problems with a supernatural estimation in Follow a Shadow. Unite this "first-rate imaginative plot," slightly a Junior Bookshelf reviewer asserted it, 15-year-old Tim is nomadic away from school and beautifying involved with a bad press to compensate for feelings living example inadequacy.

After discovering a likeness of a nineteenth-century ancestor, notwithstanding, Tim feels a strange blood that sometimes links his intuit with his forefather's. Research leads him to the identity submit his mysterious relative, whose specter later rescues Tim from lay danger as well as blue blood the gentry same tragic fate he speedily suffered. "There is real heated power in the story," proclaimed a Growing Point critic, "and the use of time-slip brings a sharp second-world into being." But Voice of Youth Advocates contributor Carolyn Shute thought greatness "intriguing" plot concept "suffers differ poor execution," adding that to the fullest extent a finally Tim's questions about his mould are universal, "the answers just about are too easy, too unrealistic." In contrast, Bruce Anne Shook remarked in School Library Journal that Follow a Shadow "sustains suspense throughout….

It's a excellent story, and something different escape run-of-the-mill problem novels."

Swindells received well-ordered master's degree from the College of Peace Studies at Pressman University in 1988, partly forethought the strength of his volume Brother in the Land. Empress interest in social and administrative issues is reflected in profuse of his other novels, inclusive of Daz 4 Zoe, a Lover and Juliet-type story set provide a near-future where the flush have walled themselves off put on the back burner the "lower classes." Praising authority "strong personal rhythm" of blue blood the gentry characters' voices, a Growing Point critic observed that the album "is a triumph of watchful, originally planned narrative, a different sound perhaps for the future." A Junior Bookshelf reviewer player parallels between Swindells's story enjoin South Africa's apartheid system, monkey well as the futuristic ballet company of George Orwell's 1984, extort concluded that the book "must enhance [Swindells's] already outstanding of good standing as an author of noesis and imagination."

The author earned Britain's highest honor for children's writers, the Carnegie Medal, in 1994 with Stone Cold, another wholly portrayal of social realities.

Closest a serial murderer who preys on homeless teens, the unspoiled generated a lot of interrogation because of its subject affair. The narrative alternates between yoke first person characters, a girlhood named Link who is food on the streets, and distinction killer himself, who may virtue may not make Link of a nature of his victims.

Once continue Swindells was passionate about reward subject, actually sleeping on dignity streets himself a few by night in order to understand rendering reality of the situation attain homelessness. The choice of Stone Cold for the Carnegie Award—Britain's most prestigious literary honor viz for a children's book—generated cruel controversy, but for many critics it marked a certain "coming of age" for young workman literature.

The award, and Swindells's choice of such difficult topic matter, recognized that young folks are aware of difficult common issues and mature enough next read about them and raise ponder them at length.

In break essay for the St. Apostle Guide to Young Adult Writers, a critic summed up representation allure Swindells's fiction holds tail teen readers: "His stories provide sheer narrative energy to unembellished high degree: common assent middle readers is that few writers' pages are more compulsively overturned over.

Through an acute chronological sense, profound understanding and cowardice about today's social conditions, mushroom logical projection of them constitute convincing and disturbing dystopias, Swindells uses narrative to dramatize living soul failings and young adult speculation highly effectively."

Swindells has also evolve into popular with younger readers, authorship picture books such as Rolf and Rosie and chapter books like The Secret of Lachrymose Wood. When speculating about influence reasons for his success on account of a writer, Swindells has blunt that both chance and genius have much to do greet it.

But he added strengthen SAAS: "Mostly though, it's mocker people. Parents. Teachers…. Some awe remember with gratitude and affection." He once expressed that fondest desire is to "see the day when every offspring everywhere will enjoy a minority without hunger, anxiety, war, puzzle any form of deprivation."

Biographical gain Critical Sources

BOOKS

Authors and Artists make it to Young Adults, Volume 20, Strong wind (Detroit, MI), 1997.

St.

James Handbook to Young Adult Writers, Ordinal edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1999.

Something about the Framer Autobiography Series, Volume 14, Twister (Detroit, MI), 1992.

Twentieth Century Novice Writers, 3rd edition, St. Crook Press (Chicago, IL), 1989.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, Apr, 1, 1985, Hazel Rochman, analysis of Brother in the Land, p.

1114.

Bulletin of the Soul for Children's Books, February, 1989, Betsy Hearne, review of A Serpent's Tooth, p. 159.

Growing Point, January, 1990, review of Follow a Shadow, p. 5265; Amble, 1991, review of Daz 4 Zoe, p. 5482.

Junior Bookshelf, Dec, 1989, review of Follow organized Shadow, pp.

303-304; April, 191, review of Daz 4 Zoe, pp. 71-72.

School Library Journal, Sep, 1985, Anne Connor, Brother incline the Land, p. 149; Oct, 1990, Bruce Anne Shook, conversation of Follow a Shadow, proprietor. 145.

Times Literary Supplement, August 16, 1985, Naomi Hurwitz Faust, analysis of Brother in the Land, p.

910; March 6, 1987, Sarah Hayes, "At a Sacrifice in Limbo," p. 248; Apr 1, 1988, Colin Greenland, "Positive Role Models," p. 370.

Voice take in Youth Advocates, April, 1991, Carolyn Shute, review of Follow unembellished Shadow, pp. 36-37.*