Bernard Ashley is one of the top writers for teenagers today. Drawing on his experience as a headteacher in a South London school he writes exciting, hard-hitting stories for the young adult reader plus picture book and younger fiction texts.

Bernard's first novel, The Trouble with Donovan Croft won the 'Other Award', an alternative to the Carnegie Award (for which he has been shortlisted twice) and since then Bernard has written extensively both for television and the children's book market. His adaptation of his own novel Dodgem won the Royal Television Society Award for the Best Children's Entertainment Programme and was shown in fifteen different countries. Bernard has written a number of successful novels for Orchard Books. Tiger Without Teeth chosen as the Guardian's Children's Book of the Week, Little Soldier, about the gang-run estates of inner London, shortlisted for both the Carnegie and Guardian Fiction Award and Revenge House, a hard-hitting crime thriller for teenagers. All show Bernard's highly-charged and compelling approach. Ten Days to Zero introduced the investigative journalist Ben Maddox in a gripping, action-packed thriller about the deportation of a South American exile facing the death penalty in his own country. Maddox returns in Bernard's latest novel Down to the Wire when the journalist finds himself caught up in the dangerous politics surrounding the signing of a young African footballer for an English team.

Philip Pullman said of Bernard in the Guardian "A commonplace setting, an everyday situation, ordinary characters. Bernard Ashley's great gift is to turn what seems to be a low key realism into something much stronger and more resonant. It has to be something to do with empathy, compassion and an undimmed thirst for decency and justice"

Bernard Ashley lives in South East London only a street or so from where he was born. During his time as a teacher and headteacher he worked in Kent, Hertfordshire, Newham and Greenwich. He is on The Board of Governors at the Greenwich Theatre and is a member of the BAFTA Children's Awards Committe.

Visit Bernard Ashley at his own website at www.bashley.com

"Compelling and unforgettable" - Time Out on Little Soldier

"A powerful novel that addresses issues affecting British teenagers today." - The Bookseller on Freedom Flight

Questions and Answers

What are your favourite children's books?
The White Sparrow by Roy Brown (sadly dead) was an inspiration to me.

What famous person would you like to meet and why?
I should like to meet Frank Sinatra - just to say thank you for all the pleasure he gave to so many of us - and continues to give, thanks to video and CD.

What is your perfect sandwich?
A steak baguette, eaten on a French boulevard in the sun with a glass (no, bottle) of the best red wine of the region.

What kind of animal would you be and why?
A tiger, beautiful and proud or that monkey who in a very long shot, it's said, could randomly type a masterpiece.

What is your earliest childhood memory?
My earliest childhood memory - very hazy - is at my mother's breast. Later I recall meeting my grandfather in the street, dressed in his Sunday best. He was on top of the world and gave me half a crown - a fortune in those days. My father saved it for me.

Bibliography

Double the Love Down to the Wire Freedom Flight Little Soldier Revenge House Ten Days to Zero Tiger Without Teeth

Copyright © 2006: The Watts Publishing Group.