Joan Aiken

Beginning at age 16, Joan Aiken launched a writing career that would last for more than 60 years. She would write more than 35 books for young adults, several collections of poems and short stories, and a total of more than 100 books.

Her works would win accolades such as the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, the Manchester Guardian Award, and the Edgar Allen Poe Award. Born in Rye, England in 1924, Aiken once lived in a haunted house, perhaps the inspiration for much of her later creepy and horror works. She came from a family of writers. Her father won a Pulitzer Prize for his poetry. Her mother, stepfather, and sister were also all writers. Her mother homeschooled her until she was 12.

Her first children's story was written for the BBC Children's Hour when she was 16. She went on to work for them, St. Thomas Hospital, the United Nations, and Argosy magazine. Her first major novel was delayed after the death of her husband, but she picked it up many years later and finished the alternate-history novel that would seal her fame and launch her first series, The Wolves of Willougby Cross.

Her works range from adult fantasy, crime, mysteries, gothic romances, and children's fantasy. Her children's work is populated with quirky characters living in dreamy, almost surreal settings.

Joan Aiken died in January 2004 at the age of 79.

Bibliography

Wolves of Willoughby Chase Series
The Wolves of Willoughby Chase	Blackhearts in Battersea
Nightbirds on Nantucket Review: One of the great joys I've reaped from searching out great books for you to read is that I've been able to rediscover (Read the rest of our review)
The Whispering Mountain	Others:
The Cuckoo Tree	More Than You Bargained For
Midnight Is A Place	The Kingdom and the Cave
Stolen Lake	The Silence of Herondale
Dido and Pa	The Fortune Hunters
Is Underground	Beware of the Bouquet
Cold Shoulder Road	The Cockatrice Boys
Dangerous Games	Trouble With Product X
Midwinter Nightingale	Dark Interval
	Hate Begins At Home
Felix series	The Ribs of Death
Go Saddle the Sea	Armitage Armitage, Fly Away Home
Bridle the Wind	The Crystal Crow
Teeth of the Gale	Girl’s Choice
	Night Fall
Mortimer and Arabel series	The Embroidered Sunset
Arabel’s Raven	The Butterfly Picnic
Mortimer’s Tie	A Cluster of Separate Sparks
Arabel and Mortimer	Died on a Rainy Sunday
Escaped Black Mamba	Winterthing: A Play for Children
Bread Bin	The Mooncusser’s Daughter: A Play for Children
Mortimer’s Cross	Voices in an Empty House
Mortimer, Arabel, and the Escaped Black Mamba	Castle Barbane
Mortimer Says Nothing	Last Movement
Mortimer and the Sword Excalibur	The Five-Minute Marriage
Mortimer and Arabel	Mice and Mendelson
Mortimer’s Mine	The Smile of a Stranger
	Street: A Play
Short Stories and Poetry Collections	The Lightning Tree
All You’ve Ever Wanted	The Shadow Guests
Necklace of Raindrops	The Weeping Ash
A Small Pinch of Weather	The Girl From Paris
The Windscreen Weepers	Foul Matter
The Kingdom Under the Sea	The Kitchen Warriors
Smoke from Cromwell’s Time	Mansfield Revisited
The Green Flash	Deception
A Bundle of Nerves	If I Were You
A Harp of Fishbones	The Moon’s Revenge
All But a Few	The Erl King Daughter
Not What You Expected	The Mystery of Mr. Jones’s Disappearing Taxi
The Skin Spinners	Voices
The Faithless Lollybird	Blackground
The Far Forests	Jane Fairfax
Tale of a One-Way Street	Return to Harken House
A Touch of Chill	The Shoemaker’s Boy
Whisper in the Night	Morningquest
A Fit of Shivers	The Spiral Stair
Fog Hounds, Wind Cat, Sea Mice	The Midnight Moropus
Give Yourself a Fright	Eliza’s Daughter
Up the Chimney Down	The Winter Sleepwalker
Last Slice of Rainbow	A Handful of Gold
Past Eight O’ Clock	Mayhem in Rumbury
A Goose On Your Grave	Emma Watson
The Haunting of Lamb House	The Youngest Miss Ward
A Foot in the Grave	Lady Catherine’s Necklace
Shadows and Moonshine	Song of Mat and Ben
Haunting Christmas Tales	Bone and Dream
A Creepy Company	Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
Moon Cake	The Wooden Dragon
Ghostly Beasts	The Witch of Clatteringshaw
Snow Horse