Gillian Cross facts for kids

Gillian Claire Cross (born December 24, 1945) is a British author of children's books. She won the 1990 Carnegie Medal for Wolf and the 1992 Whitbread Children's Book Award for The Great Elephant Chase. She also wrote The Demon Headmaster book series, which was later turned into a television series by the BBC in January 1996; a sequel series was produced in 2019.

Personal life and education

Gillian Clare Arnold was born in London on 24 December 1945 to James Eric and Joan Emma Arnold. As a girl, she attended the North London Collegiate School. She married Martin Cross on May 10, 1967.

Later, she received a Bachelor of Arts with first-class honours from Somerville College, Oxford in 1969, and a Master of Arts from the same university in 1972. In 1974, she received a Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Sussex.

Cross and her husband had four children: Jonathan George, Elizabeth Jane, Colman Anthony Richard, Katherine Clare.

Career

Before becoming a full-time writer, Cross held several different jobs, including acting as an assistant to a Member of Parliament.

In 1979, she published her first book, The Runaway. Three years later, she inaugurated The Demon Headmaster series of eight books (1982 to 2019). The same year, she also completed The Dark Behind the Curtain, a horror story illustrated by David Parkins and published by Oxford University Press. It was highly commended for the 1982 Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject. A Map of Nowhere, published in 1988, was highly commended for the 1988 Carnegie. Two years later, she won the Medal two years later for Wolf, which was also runner-up for the 1991 Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.

In early 2014, she became a patron for the Leamington Spa-based charity Cord, after their work in Sudan inspired her latest novel, After Tomorrow.

In the 2024 Dorset Council election, Gillian Cross contested Beacon ward as a Labour Party candidate.

Awards and honours

Three of Cross's books are Junior Library Guild selections: The Great American Elephant Chase (1995), New World (1995), and Pictures in the Dark (1997).

In 1987, The Horn Book Magazine has included two of Cross's books on their list of the best fiction of the year: Roscoe’s Leap (1987) and The Great American Elephant Chase (1993).