Bernard Ashley

Bernard John Ashley (born April 1935) is a British author of books for children and young adults. His debut novel, The Trouble with Donovan Croft, published in 1974, won "The Other Award", an alternative to the Carnegie Medal. A Kind of Wild Justice (1978), Running Scared (1986), and Little Soldier (1999) were commended runners up for the Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book. The first two have been reissued by OUP in their Children's Modern Classics series, the third re-issued in a 15th anniversary edition. Ashley's TV drama Dodgem (based on his own novel) won the Royal Television Society Award for Best Entertainment programme (BBC) in 1993. Born in Woolwich, south London, Ashley trained as a teacher at Trent Park College of Education after his National Service in the RAF. His teaching career included thirty years as headteacher, his most recent schools being in south and east London, experience which gave the setting for many of his stories. He has recently been awarded an honorary Doctorate in Education by the University of Greenwich and an honorary Doctorate in Letters by the University of Leicester.

In the early sixties, Ashley completed an account of the lifeboat service for children, The Men and the Boats, first in the Serving Our Society series published by Allman & Son. Another in the SOS series was his Weather Men (1971), about the meteorological service.

He is now working full-time as a writer. His children's books present a gritty realism that children identify with, which provides a context for empathy and compassion for the underdog, and a desire for decency, justice and morality. They are often set in urban environments plagued by poverty and crime. Some are set in wartime, including his 24th full-length novel for young people, Shadow of the Zeppelin (2014), and his 25th, Dead End Kids (2015). His latest novel is "Does She Dare?' (Troika 2017) set in 1911 featuring a young feminist hero.