Gillian Cross is NOT scary - even though she invented The Demon Headmaster!

Gillian has been telling stories for as long as she can remember. She wrote her first story when she was six, and even when she wasn't writing she was entertaining her friends on the way home from school by telling them a long serial that whiled away the Underground journey.

Gillian first got published in 1974 when two books were accepted in one year - and she hasn't stopped writing since. She's written over 40 books and won the Carnegie Medal and the Smarties Prize. Her best-known books are the stories about The Demon Headmaster who can control his school with his strange, hypnotic eyes.

Gillian writes in a small, cold, dark room behind her kitchen. It used to be a larder and it has no view so she cannot be distracted. Gillian can write with both her hands, and with her right foot - but not all at once!

When Gillian isn't writing she loves playing the piano and orienteering (she once came first in a competition because everyone else had given up!) Gillian has four children who she lets read her books, but only when they are finished. Her favourite book as a child was The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. Her favourites among her own books are Wolf and The Great Elephant Chase.