Flambards is a novel for children or young adults by K. M. Peyton, first published by Oxford University Press in 1967 with illustrations by Victor Ambrus. Alternatively, "Flambards" is the trilogy (1967–1969) or series (1967–1981) named after its first book. The series is set in England just before, during, and after World War I.
Susan Mary Cooper is an English author of children's books. She is best known for The Dark Is Rising, a contemporary fantasy series set in England and Wales, which incorporates British mythology such as the Arthurian legends and Welsh folk heroes. For that work, in 2012 she won the lifetime Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association, recognizing her contribution to writing for teens. In the 1970s two of the five novels were named the year's best English-language book with an "authentic Welsh background" by the Welsh Books Council. In 2024, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association named her the 40th Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master in recognition of her significant contributions to the literature of science fiction and fantasy.
The Grey King is a contemporary fantasy novel by Susan Cooper, published almost simultaneously by Chatto & Windus and Atheneum in 1975. It is the fourth of five books in her Arthurian fantasy series The Dark is Rising.
The Guardian Children's Fiction Prize or Guardian Award was a literary award that annual recognised one fiction book written for children or young adults and published in the United Kingdom. It was conferred upon the author of the book by The Guardian newspaper, which established it in 1965 and inaugurated it in 1967. It was a lifetime award in that previous winners were not eligible. At least from 2000 the prize was £1,500. The prize was apparently discontinued after 2016, though no formal announcement appears to have been made.
William James Carter Mayne was an English writer of children's fiction. The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature calls him one of the outstanding children's authors of the 20th century and The Times Literary Supplement reportedly called him "the most original good writer for young people in our time". In 2004, he was convicted of sexual abuse.
Gwyneth Jones is an English science fiction and fantasy writer and critic, and a young adult/children's writer under the pen name Ann Halam.
Jenny Nimmo is a British author of children's books, including fantasy and adventure novels, chapter books, and picture books. Born in England, she has lived mostly in Wales for 40 years. She is probably best known for two series of fantasy novels: The Magician Trilogy (1986–1989), contemporary stories rooted in Welsh myth, and Children of the Red King (2002–2010), featuring schoolchildren endowed with magical powers. The Snow Spider, first of the Magician books, won the second annual Nestlé Smarties Book Prize and the 1987 Tir na n-Og Award as the year's best originally English-language book with an authentic Welsh background. The Stone Mouse was highly commended for the 1993 Carnegie Medal. Several others of hers have been shortlisted for children's book awards.
Kevin John William Crossley-Holland is an English translator, children's author and poet. His best known work is probably the Arthur trilogy (2000–2003), for which he won the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize and other recognition.
Susan Price is an English author of children's and young adult novels. She has won both the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize for British children's books.
Jennifer Sullivan is a Welsh writer for children and adults, and a former literary critic. She is best known for her Magic Apostrophe series of children's fantasy books. She is a recipient of the Tir na n-Og Award.
Catherine Fisher is a poet and novelist for children and Young Adults. Best known for her internationally bestselling novel Incarceron and its sequel, Sapphique, she has published over 40 novels and 5 volumes of poetry. She has worked as an archaeologist, and as a school and university teacher, is an experienced broadcaster and adjudicator and has taught at the Arvon Foundation and Ty Newydd Writers' Centres. She lives in Wales, UK.
Malcolm Charles Peet was an English writer and illustrator best known for young adult fiction. He has won several honours including the Brandford Boase, the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize, British children's literature awards that recognise "year's best" books. Three of his novels feature football and the fictional South American sports journalist Paul Faustino. The Murdstone Trilogy (2014) and "Mr Godley's Phantom" were his first works aimed at adult readers.
Marcus Sedgwick was a British writer and illustrator. He authored several young adult and children's books and picture books, a work of nonfiction and several novels for adults, and illustrated a collection of myths and a book of folk tales for adults. According to School Library Journal his "most acclaimed titles" were those for young adults.
The Magician Trilogy is a series of three children's fantasy novels by the British author Jenny Nimmo, first published by Methuen 1986 to 1989. It is sometimes called the Snow Spider trilogy or series after the first book and The Snow Spider Trilogy is the title of its omnibus editions. The stories are inspired by Welsh mythology, with elements borrowed from Mabinogion. Set in contemporary Wales, they feature Gwyn Griffiths, a boy descended from Gwydion who discovers and develops some of the magical power in his lineage.
The Tir na n-Og Awards are a set of annual children's literary awards in Wales from 1976. They are presented by the Books Council of Wales to the best books published during the preceding calendar year in each of three awards categories, one English-language and two Welsh-language. Their purpose is "[to raise] the standard of children's and young people's books and to encourage the buying and reading of good books." There is no restriction to fiction or prose. Each prize is £1,000.
Kate Thompson is a British Irish writer best known for children's novels. Most of her children's fiction is fantasy but several of her books also deal with the consequences of genetic engineering.
The New Policeman is a children's fantasy novel by Kate Thompson, published by Bodley Head in 2005. Set in Kinvara, Ireland, it features a teenage boy, J. J. Liddy, who learns that time is leaking from the human world into Tir na nOg, the land of the fairies. It inaugurated a series that is sometimes referred to as the Liddy series.
Hayley Long is an English author best known for her teen fiction. She is a recipient of the Tir na n-Og Award.
At the Crossing Places is the second book in the Arthur trilogy by Kevin Crossley-Holland. It is a children's historical fantasy and an Arthurian legend, and recounts the story of the squire Arthur de Caldicot in the year 1200 after the events of The Seeing Stone. The book was also released in an audio format by Listening Library, consisting of six cassette tapes.
