Books

For a full bibliography, see INFORMATION

Andersen Press 2001 IBSN 0-86264-770-3	Lady - My Life as Bitch. A great huge fuss in the press about this one. The Manchester Evening News ran an article full of outraged opinion and the local school threatened to sue me. All very silly - of course the journalists know who to ring up to get an "outrage story" Anyone can do it even if there's only three people in Manchester who really disaproove - it's just lazy journalism really. Still ... very good for sales!	Penguin Books February 2003 IBSN 014 13 10286
The Chicken House, April 2001 For more about Billy Elliot, click here	Billy Elliot A novelisation of the hugely successful film, from the screenplay by Lee Hall. A great experience - writing it showed me a great deal about the difference between the two ways of telling a story - on film and in a book. The result is written in several different voices, as in JUNK and BLOODTIDE.

Andersen Press, 2000

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Andersen Press, 2000

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A 12 year old boy discovers that he can creep about the block of flats where he lives inside the ventilation system. But it seems that the building is haunted. An old man on the floor above has lost his memory - what has he got to do with the Ghost of Mahogany Villas?

SHORTLISTED FOR THE CARNEGIE MEDAL 2000

Puffin Books, 2002

IBSN 0-14-131027-8

Andersen Press, 1999

This is the hardest book and most controversial I've done, but I think the most successful. Set in a decaying, futuristic London taken over by gang-law, it is a tragic story of love and hate, revenge and destiny. Described as repulsive, compulsive, disgusting and classic, its imagery is drawn from computer games, film and comics, and the story itself from the ancient Icelandic Volsunga saga. I still have to make up my mind whether or not to do Bloodtide 2

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IBSN: 0-14-130689-0

Penguin 2001

This is one for the adults- a story of Manchester gangland.

Barrington Stoke, paperback. 1999

A&C Black, Hardback, 1998

A Flashback for A&C Black, about Mudlarks in Victorian London. I was thinking of a couple of boys I used to know (not in Victorian times!) who skived off school and spent the day thieving off factories. One day, the roof they were on fell in and one of them died.

A&C Black, paperback,1999

Andersen Press, 1998

When I was a boy, collecting bird's eggs wasn't exactly a good thing to do, but it wasn't so awful as it is today, when birds are under such threat. This story is about a boy beginning to realize how vulnerable some birds are. Taylor's father is a gamekeeper, and when the landowner, Harris, orders him to destroy the rare red Kites, Taylor's loyalty is torn.

Puffin, paperback, 1999

Andersen Press, 1996

This is the one that won the Carnegie medal - and you never saw such a fuss in all your life. Anyone would have thought there was a free pack of soft drugs with every copy!

Penguin, 1997

Andersen Press, 1996

People were always asking me to do a sequel to the Cry of the Wolf; but there's no sequel to extinction. So I did this instead. It's based on an eastern myth of the Spirit tiger, that I made up just for the occasion.

Puffin, 1998

Andersen Press, 1995

I remembered a huge storm that laid all the trees in the south of England flat, as if a giant had combed them. Then I imaged that as the wind tore one of the trees up by its roots, a secret was pulled up out of the ground

Puffin, 1997

IBSN 0-14-037444-2

Andersen Press, 1995

Ever noticed how girl/boy books are always sold as girly books? This was my first attempt at a boy/girl book boys would like. It's not as though you’re not interested, is it, fellers? As you can see, I didn't quite make it. But maybe next time …

Puffin, 1996

Andersen Press, 1993

One of my favorites. It's based on the death squads in Central America, but set in London, England. A group of kids living on a dump discover a kidnapped Baby worth 17 million pounds …

Puffin, 1995

Andersen Press, 1992

An Angel for May

I based this one in the Pennine Village where I lived, Earby. Poor old Rosy was an old woman I'd seen years before in London. She looked so sad and so broken, but it made me wonder what sort of a child she'd been, and if maybe she had been happy then. What had happened to her to make her into what she was today?

Puffin, 1994, 2002

IBSN 0-14-131027-8

Andersen Press, 1992

Burning Issy

Puffin didn’t want this one and neither did a lot of other people. I thought witches were an obvious choice for a book, but no one told me you weren't supposed to write about real witches. This is still the only book I've ever been asked not to talk about at a school.

Hodder Headline, 1993, 1996, Puffin Books 2002

Andersen Press, 1990

This was my first published book - I was on the verge of thinking I wasn't going to make it as a writer when Andersen Press accepted it. A lot of people still think it's my best one.

Puffin, 1991