Joan Lingard

Joan Lingard is a name instantly recognisable to those interested in children’s books, although she also wrote for adults. Her career spanned five decades, with her most recent children’s book, Trouble on Cable Street, released by Catnip Publishing in  2014.

Joan Lingard was born in Scotland but the family moved to Belfast when she was two. She lived there till she was eighteen. Her debut novel, The Twelfth Day of July (Penguin), the first of the classic Kevin and Sadie series, is set in Belfast during the Troubles and was originally published in 1970. Across the Barricades, also part of the series, received the prestigious West German award, the Buxthuderbulle, in 1986. She moved back to Scotland and worked tirelessly for the industry, as part of Scottish PEN and through her many events with Scottish Book Trust.

Tug Of War has also enjoyed great success: shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal 1989, The Federation of Children’s Book Group Award 1989, it was runner-up in the Lancashire Children’s Book Club of the Year 1990 and shortlisted for the Sheffield Book Award. In 2009 Lingard won the Royal Mail Award for Scottish Children’s Books, in 1998 was awarded an MBE for services to literature.

Lingard comments that her work is often about displacement, of characters uprooting themselves, and facing up to new experiences.