Young Adults' author Kate Thompson for The Forge at Gort

galway | arts and media | event notice Tuesday January 26, 2010 17:02 by Fred Johnston - The Western Writers' Centre - Ionad Scribhneoirí Chaitlin Maude westernwriters at eircom dot net Canavan Hse., Nuns Island, Galway 087.2178138

Kate to read Saturday, March 27th, at 3pm - venue to be announced

Kate Thompson is an award-winning writer for children and adults. Born in Halifax, Yorkshire, she has lived in Ireland, where many of her books are set, since 1981. She is the youngest child of the social historians and peace activists E. P. Thompson and Dorothy Towers.

Kate worked with horses and travelled in India before settling in the west of Ireland with her partner Conor. They have two daughters, Cliodhna and Dearbhla. She is an accomplished fiddler with an interest in Irish traditional music, reflected in The New Policeman.
While Kate Thompson's children's fiction is primarily fantasy, several of her books also deal with the consequences of genetic engineering.
She has won the Bisto Children's Book of the Year Award four times, for The Beguilers, The Alchemist's Apprentice, Annan Water and The New Policeman. The New Policeman was also awarded the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, the Whitbread Children's Book Award and theDublin Airport Authority Children's Book of the Year Award for 2005. Creature of the Night was shortlisted for the 2008 Booktrust Teenage Prize, and has been shortlisted for the 2009 Carnegie Medal.

Further details of this event, which is free, can be had from westernwriters@eircom.net or 087.2178138 Our thanks to The Arts Council.