Gillian Clare Arnold was born in London on 24 December 1945 to James Eric and Joan Emma Arnold.[2] As a girl, she attended the North London Collegiate School. She married Martin Cross on May 10, 1967.[1]
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.[3] It was highly commended for the 1982 Carnegie Medal[4][a] 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.[4][a] Two years later, she won the Medal two years later for Wolf,[5] which was also runner-up for the 1991 Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.[citation needed]
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.[6]
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).[11]
Calling a Dead Man (2001); US title, Phoning a Dead Man
The Treasure in the Mud (2001)
Dark Ground trilogy, or The Lost trilogy:
The Dark Ground (2004)
The Black Room (2005)
The Nightmare Game (2006)
Sam Sorts It Out (2005)
Brother Aelred's Feet (2007)
Where I Belong (2007)
After Tomorrow (2013)
Shadow Cat (2015)
Notes
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Cross was also a commended runner up twice, for Chartbreak (1986) and The Great Elephant Chase (1992).
• Since 1995 there are usually eight books on the Carnegie shortlist.
According to CCSU, some runners up through 2002 were Commended (from 1954) or Highly Commended (from 1966). The latter distinction was approximately annual from 1979, with 29 in 24 years including Cross alone in 1982 and three in 1988.
• No one has won three Carnegie Medals (awarded for 1936 to 2011 publications). Seven authors have won two. Among the dozens to win one, Cross and Melvin Burgess also wrote two Highly Commended books (1966–2002). (Burgess was a runner up for The Cry of the Wolf when Cross won the medal for Wolf.)
