Alan Albert Gibbons (born 14 August 1953) is an English writer of children's books and campaigner known for his advocacy of libraries.
He has written over 60 books and won a number of awards including a Blue Peter Book Award for his best-selling book Shadow of the Minotaur.
Gibbons lives in Liverpool, England, where he worked as a primary school teacher and where he is a local councillor.
Early life and career
Gibbons was born in Warrington, Cheshire. His father was a farm labourer, but was badly hurt in an accident when Alan was eight years old. The family had to move to Crewe, Cheshire.[1]
Gibbons worked as a journalist and in a number of factory jobs before training to be a teacher in his mid-thirties.[2]
Literary career
While working as a teacher in Knowsley, Gibbons started writing short stories for his students. Later, he began to write professionally.[3]
Best known for writing children's and young adult fiction, Gibbons has written over 60 books, which have been translated into dozens of languages.[4] He has won numerous awards including a Blue Peter Book Award, Angus Book Award and Leicester Book of the Year Award, and was twice shortlisted for a Carnegie Medal.
He has been a regular speaker at the Edinburgh Book Festival, the London Book Fair, the Northern Children's Book Festival, the Hay on Wye Literary Festival, the Cheltenham Literature Festival and others.[5] Gibbons also works as an educational consultant and speaks at schools across the UK and abroad.[6] In addition to his writing, Gibbons is a frequent speaker on education and literacy issues, and has appeared on numerous television and radio programs.
Gibbons' work often deal with issues such as racism, poverty and social justice. In Socialist Review, Michael Rosen said that Gibbons’ novels focus mainly on the lives of "working-class children and teenagers". His stories are fast-moving and often include moments in which the protagonists make "personal socio-political choices."[7]
Campaign against library closures
In 2010, Gibbons founded the Campaign for the Book to promote reading and libraries, and to lobby for better funding and support for library services.[8] He strongly criticised the Conservative and Liberal DemocratCoalition Government's austerity policies and funding cuts, which would see almost 800 public libraries close.[9]
As part of this campaign, Gibbons initiated countrywide 'read ins' to protest against library closures, which he described as a "cultural crime". Some 110 events took place across the country, involving up to 10,000 people.[10]
In 2011, he launched a new initiative, calling for a National Libraries Day to celebrate reading for pleasure and library services.[11] This rapidly won the backing of many organisations for an annual event on the first Saturday in February, and eventually evolved into National Libraries Week.[12][2]
In addition to his work as a writer and library campaigner, Gibbons is a lifelong socialist and trade unionist.
In 1974, Gibbons joined the International Socialists, forerunner to the Socialist Workers Party, where he was an organiser and member of the National Committee, before becoming disillusioned and leaving the party in 1996.[14] He was President of Knowsley National Union of Teachers (NUT) and a member of the Anti-Nazi League.[15]
Gibbons organised Authors Against SATs, which campaigned for the abolition of the SATs testing regime. In 2010, the group released a statement supporting teaching unions' decision to boycott the tests.[16]
During his time in the Labour Party, Gibbons served on Momentum's National Coordinating Group for two years and spoke at many left-wing rallies and events including The World Transformed. He was briefly suspended from the party in 2020 for allowing a motion in support of Corbyn to be passed at a CLP meeting.[18]
In March 2022, Gibbons was among a group of seven Liverpool Labour councillors who broke the whip to vote against the ruling party's proposed budget for Liverpool City Council. In his speech, he said: "Liverpool’s communities are at breaking point. As a matter of conscience, I am not prepared to vote for cuts that will make life harder for the people I represent".[19]
The councillors who took part in the rebellion were suspended by the Labour Party.[20] Shortly after, Gibbons was expelled. The party claimed this was because he had given an interview to the left-wing Socialist Appeal, which was proscribed by the party leadership.[18]
Following his expulsion from the Labour Party, Gibbons became deputy leader of the Liverpool Community Independents group of councillors on Liverpool City Council.[21] In the 2023 Liverpool City Council election, Gibbons was re-elected as an independent for the new Orrell Park ward with 77% of the vote, beating the Labour candidate by 1068 votes. He was one of three Liverpool Community Independent councillors to be elected.[22][23] In November 2023 Gibbons joined a new party, Transform, as the Liverpool Community Independents had merged into them.[24]
Awards and honours
In 2000, Gibbons won a Blue Peter Book Award in 'The Book I Couldn't Put Down' category for Shadow of the Minotaur. He was a judge for the 2001 Blue Peter Book Awards.
He was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal twice in 2001 and 2003, and shortlisted twice for the Booktrust Teenage Prize. He has also won the Leicester Book of the Year, the Stockport Book Award, the Angus Book Award, the Catalyst Award, the Birmingham Chills Award, the Salford Young Adult Book Award, the Hackney Short Novel Prize, the Our Best Book Award and the Salford Librarians' Special Award.[5]
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