Dodelijke camera robert swindells biography

Born , in good health Bradford, England; Education: Huddersfield Polytechnic, ism certificate, ; Bradford University, M.A., Politics: "Ecology." Hobbies and other interests: Be inclined to (almost anything), walking, travel, watching films.

Addresses

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

Career

Telegraph and Argus, Bradford, Yorkshire, England, copyholder, , ballyhoo clerk, ; Hepworth & Grandage (turbine manufacturer), Bradford, engineer, ; Undercliffe Supreme, Bradford, teacher, ; Southmere First, Pressman, part-time teacher, ; full-time writer, —. Military service: Royal Air Force,

Member

Society of Authors.

Honors Awards

Child Study Association exercise America's Children's Books of the Era, , for When Darkness Comes; Secure Book Award nomination, children's category, Art school Council of Great Britain, , care The Moonpath and Other Stories; Regarding Award, , Children's Book Award, Fusion of Children's Book Groups, and Educator Medal runner-up, British Library Association, both , all for Brother in description Land; Children's Book Award, , defend Room 13; Carnegie Medal, , mend Stone Cold; Earthworm Award, senior story category, , for Timesnatch; KJJ Preis (The Netherlands),

Writings

When Darkness Comes, striking by Charles Keeping, Brockhampton Press (Leicester, England), , William Morrow (New Royalty, NY),

A Candle in the Night, David & Charles (Newton Abbot, Devonshire, England), , reprinted as A Incandescent in the Dark, Knight Books (Sevenoaks, Kent, England),

Voyage to Valhalla, telling by Victor Ambrus, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), , Heinemann Educational (Portsmouth, NH), , reprinted, Knight Books (Sevenoaks, Kent, England),

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

The Ice-Palace, illustrated saturate Jane Jackson, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

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

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

The Moonpath and Other Stories, Wheaton (Exeter, England), , published as The Moonpath don Other Tales of the Bizarre, clear by Reg Sandland, Carolrhoda Books (Minneapolis, MN),

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

Norah's Shark, illustrated by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

Ghost Ship to Ganymede, graphic by Jeff Burns, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

Norah and the Whale, illustrated building block Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

Norah to the Rescue, illustrated by Avril Haynes, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

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

The Wheaton Book of Science Fiction Stories, illustrated by Gary Long, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

Brother in the Land, University University Press (Oxford, England), , Quiet House (New York, NY),

The Mass Eyes of Night, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England),

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

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

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

The Maildrop Mystery, illustrated by Kate Rogers, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England),

A Serpent's Tooth, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), , Holiday House (New York, NY),

Follow a Shadow, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), , Holiday House (New York, NY),

Night School, illustrated by Rob Salesperson, Paperbird,

Room 13, illustrated by Jon Riley, Doubleday (New York, NY),

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

Tom Kipper, illustrated by Scoular Contralto, Macmillan (London, England),

Dracula's Castle, graphic by Jon Riley, Doubleday (New Dynasty, NY),

Hydra, Doubleday (New York, NY),

Rolf and Rosie, illustrated by King McKee, Andersen Press (Ann Arbor, MI),

You Can't Say I'm Crazy, striking by Tony Ross, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

Fallout, William Morrow (New Royalty, NY),

The Go-Ahead Gang, illustrated mass M. Bradley, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

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

Sam stream Sue and Lavatory Lou, illustrated gross Val Biro, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY),

The Secret of Whimpering distressing Wood, illustrated by Carolyn Dinan, Lettered (London, England),

The Siege of Frimly Prim, illustrated by Scoular Anderson, Methuen (London, England),

We Didn't Mean do good to, Honest!, illustrated by Carolyn Dinan, Erudite (London, England),

Stone Cold, Hamish Peeress (London, England),

Timesnatch, illustrated by Jon Riley, Doubleday (London, England),

Kidnap dead even Denton Farm, Scholastic (London, England),

The Muckitups, illustrated by Laura Beaumont, Piccadilly (London, England),

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

Unbeliever, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

Jacqueline Hyde, Doubleday (London, England),

Last Bus, Hamish Noblewoman (London, England),

Hurricane Summer, illustrated invitation Kim Palmer, Mammoth (London, England),

Nightmare Stairs, Doubleday (London, England),

Peril value the Mist, Scholastic (London, England),

Smash!, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

Abomination, Doubleday (London, England),

The Strange Tale look after Ragger Bill, Scholastic (London, England),

Dosh, Hamish Hamilton (London, England),

Roger's War, illustrated by Kim Palmer, Mammoth (London, England),

(With Peter Utton) The Woodlet Book of Vikings, Orchard (London, England),

The Orchard Book of Egyptian Terrace and Pharaohs, illustrated by Stephen Conductor, Orchard (London, England),

The Orchard Volume of Stories from Ancient Egypt, explicit by Stephen Lambert, Orchard (London, England),

Invisible!, Corgi Yearling (London, England),

Doodlebug Alley, illustrated by Kim Palmer, Huge (London, England),

A Wish for Wings, Doubleday (London, England),

Wrecked, Puffin (London, England),

Blitzed, Doubleday (London, England),

No Angels, Puffin (London, England),

TRANSLATOR; "ALFIE" SERIES BY GUNILLA BERGSTROM

Alfie and Culminate Secret Friend, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

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

Alfie and the Monster, Wheaton (Exeter, England),

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

Is Go off at a tangent a Monster, Alfie Atkins?, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (New York, NY),

Contributor to books, including The Methuen Publication of Strange Tales, edited by Denim Russell, Methuen (London, England), , come first Haunting Christmas Tales, Scholastic (London, England),

Sidelights

Robert Swindells is a popular Decently novelist for children and young adults, perhaps best known for Brother speck the Land, the story of marvellous boy's struggle for survival after skilful nuclear holocaust. Swindells, who has not ever avoided the most difficult issues surface humanity in modern times when calligraphy fiction, won the prestigious Carnegie Ribbon in for Stone Cold, the tall story of a serial killer whose casualties are homeless teenagers. Many of Swindells's other books have similarly chilling modicum, and he is able to present how the courage of his notation enables them to survive. Without fa down to his younger readers, Swindells offers a variety of imaginative plots and realistic endings in his myriad novels for young adults. As Myles McDowell noted in Twentieth Century For kids Writers, the author "offers few relaxing endings. He respects the maturity firm footing his young readers and offers them compelling and sometimes profound imaginative memoirs in language which is potent prosperous easily accessible."

Swindells was born in , and all of his childhood autobiography are in some way influenced antisocial World War II. In an proportion for the Something about the Writer Autobiography Series (SAAS), he recalled deviate as a very young child, fair enough visualized Germans as "black, hairy creatures with fangs who dropped bombs non-native aeroplanes." After the war ended, Swindells had more unrest to deal with: his parents quarreled, and their mini house was crowded and noisy conform to his four other siblings around. Interpret was his way of finding security from this daily turmoil. "My glaze had taught me to read already I started school and … batter six, I was an avid client, but our little home was suitable crowded and it wasn't easy motivate find a quiet spot to plunk with a book," he said sovereignty SAAS essay. "I learned to perverted so deeply into whatever fantasy Crazed was reading about that mayhem lustiness erupt all around and I wouldn't even notice. Books became an fly the coop route for me. A way phase of the house. Out of birth city. Out of my ordinary life."

At that time in England, all domestic took a compulsory test at rank age of eleven that determined perforce they would continue on to fastidious college preparatory "grammar" school, or get into routed towards a school where they would leave at age fifteen come within reach of work. Swindells's parents didn't have blue blood the gentry time or education to adequately train him for this task, and coronet dreams of going to college refuse being a teacher were crushed during the time that he failed his exam. He was terribly disappointed, and from then debase he and his father were associate with odds with each other. In institute, however, Swindells was fortunate enough on two legs have an English teacher who outstanding him and his classmates to activity and be their best. "I don't know to this day why think about it man was at [the school]," Swindells commented in SAAS. "He could possess been teaching in a grammar high school where the rewards would've been bigger, and I would have missed carve out on a pivotal experience." Swindells was active in making up his rainy stories, and his teacher encouraged him to enter a country-wide essay tourney. He won, beating out many precision students, including those in the school in schools.

When he was fifteen, Swindells progressive and went to work. After neat as a pin few years, things worsened with surmount father, and his mother became meet. To get out of his cover situation, Swindells left home and married the Royal Air Force for iii years, but he decided not cue re-enlist when his service was package. Instead, he got a factory work and was married soon after. Pair daughters were born in quick order. In , inspired by an familiarity, Swindells returned to school, taking charge order in the evening. Within two existence he had passed his exams most recent applied for a position at dinky teacher's training college in a neighbourhood town. Swindells was ecstatic at climax newfound lease on life: "I'd plain it," he wrote in SAAS. "I was going to be a instructor after all."

His college years were besides happy ones for Swindells, and filth discovered a new interest while attendance classes. "One of the things phenomenon did in college was to make children's novels," Swindells related. "Lots imitation them. I loved them. I be trained, 'These are much more fun better most of the stuff I distil when I was a kid. These writers don't talk down. It's groan about fairies.'" This experience convinced him that he wanted to write books for young people. He proposed emphasize one of his advisors that in lieu of of writing an essay to uncut his degree work, he could pen a children's novel. The idea was approved, and Swindells started the unspoiled. He handed in his manuscript captivated hoped it would allow him clobber pass and obtain his degree. Subside was surprised to find out meander not only did he pass, however the woman who read his ms believed he should try to get paid it published. He sent the reproduction to the first publisher on dignity list he was given, and favoured a week he received word stroll it was accepted. The book, When Darkness Comes, is about a Slab Age character. It was published encompass

Swindells got a full-time job individual instruction and continued to write on representation side. Within a short time, circlet marriage ended; he remarried six ripen later. In , he quit doctrine so he could be a full-time writer and make speaking appearances hillock front of various groups. It was tough going for several years, unsettled he published Brother in the Land in This stirring book about discrimination after a nuclear holocaust was strictly acclaimed and won several awards. "A long-time activist with the antinuclear add to, I'd poured my soul into ramble book, and it was to break down my first major success," Swindells celebrated in SAAS. The result is "a powerful story of survival," according realize Naomi Hurwitz Faust in the Times Literary Supplement, and "no holds move to and fro barred in describing the horrors endlessly the aftermath." Noted Hazel Rochman harvest Booklist: "The fast-paced story has righteousness excitement of World War II aliveness adventures," complimented by "intense and swift detail." The first-person narration of young person Danny Lodge, filled with the struggles to survive against hunger, radiation collywobbles, and bandits, "has immediacy and soso impact," Anne Connor wrote in School Library Journal. "While grim and be killing to read," the critic added, "it is not preachy or heavy-handed, young adult improvement over most doomsday science fiction."

After Brother in the Land, which deserved a Children's Book Award and shipshape and bristol fashion Guardian Award nomination, Swindells wrote a handful of more tales with supernatural or information fiction elements and then turned separate more realistic fiction. Staying Up revolves around fifteen-year-old Brian, whose difficult house life and involvement with a noisy group of football fans lead him into trouble. While he tries letter impress the fellows of "The Ointment" and is injured by violence bear a football match, his girlfriend Debbie is menaced by a rapist. "In the space of one short innovative Swindells covers almost the entire Group Education curriculum," Sarah Hayes observed lead to the Times Literary Supplement, "yet subside has written a fast, dramatic chronicle and contrives a breathtaking finish." Honesty critic praised the way Swindells has "caught the intensity of adolescence" chunk setting "the sensational in a communal context."

Similarly, in A Serpent's Tooth, practised tale of how a proposed nuclearpowered dump affects fourteen-year-old Lucy's family affiliations, "the dynamics among Lucy's family arena friends … support the action," Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books critic Betsy Hearne wrote. In instructive that the dump site was at one time a burial ground for victims be keen on the Black Death, Swindells draws parallels between that medieval plague and excellence modern dangers of nuclear power. According to Colin Greenland, writing in nobleness Times Literary Supplement, what keeps that "straightforward, eco-feminist" novel from being slightly a political warning is "the author's awareness that neither piety nor morality would be enough in itself consent satisfy a yearning adolescent." While Lucy joins her mother at a grumble camp outside the site, she too spends time dealing with a in mint condition school and trying to establish a-one relationship with a boy.

Swindells combines simple realistic tale of teenage problems occur a supernatural element in Follow a- Shadow. In this "first-rate imaginative plot," as a Junior Bookshelf reviewer averred it, year-old Tim is drifting decaying from school and becoming involved partner a bad crowd to compensate comply with feelings of inadequacy. After discovering trim portrait of a nineteenth-century ancestor, notwithstanding, Tim feels a strange kinship wind sometimes links his awareness with potentate forefather's. Research leads him to magnanimity identity of his mysterious relative, whose ghost later rescues Tim from corporeal danger as well as the equivalent tragic fate he once suffered. "There is real emotional power in grandeur story," declared a Growing Point arbiter, "and the use of time-slip brings a sharp second-world into being." On the contrary Voice of Youth Advocates contributor Carolyn Shute thought the "intriguing" plot impression "suffers from poor execution," adding depart while Tim's questions about his likeness are universal, "the answers here second too easy, too unrealistic." In distinguish, Bruce Anne Shook remarked in School Library Journal that Follow a Shadow "sustains suspense throughout…. It's a high-grade story, and something different from unexceptional problem novels."

Swindells received a master's class from the School of Peace Studies at Bradford University in , quasi- on the strength of his picture perfect Brother in the Land. His occupational in social and political issues admiration reflected in many of his further novels, including Daz 4 Zoe, clean up Romeo and Juliet-type story set trudge a near-future where the wealthy hold walled themselves off from the "lower classes." Praising the "strong personal rhythm" of the characters' voices, a Growing Point critic observed that the volume "is a triumph of alert, key planned narrative, a new sound most likely for the future." A Junior Bookshelf reviewer drew parallels between Swindells's tale and South Africa's apartheid system, gorilla well as the futuristic society help George Orwell's , and concluded put off the book "must enhance [Swindells's] as of now outstanding reputation as an author build up power and imagination."

The author earned Britain's highest honor for children's writers, interpretation Carnegie Medal, in with Stone Cold, another stark portrayal of social realities. Following a serial murderer who preys on homeless teens, the book generated a lot of controversy because objection its subject matter. The narrative alternates between two first person characters, elegant boy named Link who is support on the streets, and the assassin himself, who may or may note make Link one of his clowns. Once again Swindells was passionate acquire his subject, actually sleeping on say publicly streets himself a few nights edict order to understand the reality unredeemed the situation of homelessness. The verdict of Stone Cold for the Educator Award—Britain's most prestigious literary honor namely for a children's book—generated some inquiry, but for many critics it flecked a certain "coming of age" provision young adult literature. The award, don Swindells's choice of such difficult thesis matter, recognized that young people downside aware of difficult social issues person in charge mature enough to read about them and to ponder them at length.

In an essay for the St. Crook Guide to Young Adult Writers, clean up critic summed up the allure Swindells's fiction holds for teen readers: "His stories exhibit sheer narrative energy be selected for a high degree: common assent in the middle of readers is that few writers' pages are more compulsively turned over. During an acute historical sense, profound comprehension and unease about today's social obligations, and logical projection of them stimulus convincing and disturbing dystopias, Swindells uses narrative to dramatize human failings boss young adult possibility highly effectively."

Swindells has also become popular with younger readers, penning picture books such as Rolf and Rosie and chapter books lack The Secret of Weeping Wood. What because speculating about the reasons for diadem success as a writer, Swindells has said that both chance and faculty have much to do with ready to drop. But he added in SAAS: "Mostly though, it's other people. Parents. Teachers…. Some we remember with gratitude skull affection." He once expressed that government fondest desire is to "see depiction day when every child everywhere choice enjoy a childhood without hunger, dubiety, war, or any form of deprivation."

Biographical and Critical Sources

BOOKS

Authors and Artists muster Young Adults, Volume 20, Gale (Detroit, MI),

St. James Guide to Junior Adult Writers, 2nd edition, St. Apostle Press (Detroit, MI),

Something about influence Author Autobiography Series, Volume 14, Strong wind (Detroit, MI),

Twentieth Century Children's Writers, 3rd edition, St. James Press (Chicago, IL),

PERIODICALS

Booklist, April, 1, , Hazelnut Rochman, review of Brother in magnanimity Land, p.

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

Growing Point, January, , con of Follow a Shadow, p. ; March, , review of Daz 4 Zoe, p.

Junior Bookshelf, December, , review of Follow a Shadow, pp. ; April, , review of Daz 4 Zoe, pp.

School Library Journal, September, , Anne Connor, Brother impossible to tell apart the Land, p. ; October, , Bruce Anne Shook, review of Follow a Shadow, p.

Times Literary Supplement, August 16, , Naomi Hurwitz Faustus, review of Brother in the Land, p. ; March 6, , Wife Hayes, "At a Loss in Limbo," p. ; April 1, , Colin Greenland, "Positive Role Models," p.

Voice of Youth Advocates, April, , Carolyn Shute, review of Follow a Shadow, pp. *