Alex Scarrow
We are pleased to announce that TimeRiders has been awarded the 2011 Red House Children's Book Award in the category - Older Readers.
Following the success of the first book in his time-travelling TimeRiders series, Puffin has now invested in the full nine-book suite - the biggest ever investment in a teenage series in a single acquisition. It's a commitment which Scarrow says he's "thrilled to bits" about. "This is going to be a three- or four-year rollercoaster ride," he says. "I'm already buckled in, loose change tucked away and good to go."
Contents
About Alex Scarrow
Alex Scarrow's School Visits
Alex Scarrow's Books
To make a Booking
About Alex Scarrow
Alex Scarrow used to be a rock guitarist, then he became a graphic artist, then he decided to be a computer games designer. Finally, he grew up and became an author. He has written a number of successful thrillers and several screenplays, but it's Young Adult fiction that has allowed him to really have fun with many of the really cool ideas and concepts he was playing around with when designing games.
He lives in Norwich with his son, Jacob, his wife, Frances, and one very fat rat and a naughty dog.
In November 2010, TimeRiders (book 1) was shortlisted by The Galaxy National Book Awards 2010, in the category for Children's Book of the Year. TimeRiders has also been shortlisted for the Northern Ireland Book Award 2010/2011, this award is due to be announced in April 2011.
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Alex Scarrow's School Visits
Alex gives an hour long assembly presentation to students which begins with a high energy author's talk. In this ‘behind the scenes' talk Alex introduces how he started writing, where he gets his ideas from and the various themes in his work. He discusses his background in computer designing. Alex will then show a ‘film style trailer' on the projection screen to introduce the Time Riders series of books. He discusses the concept of time travel and alternative histories, and the ‘what if's' of how things might have been different if history had been changed. The session leads into a TV style Game Show History Quiz. Children are invited on stage and the audience is split into teams for this very funny, fast paced quiz.
Author visit by Alex Scarrow on 10th January 2012 (to years 6, 7 and 8)
"Not every author starts out in life by playing in a rock band and designing computer games for the Xbox but then Alex Scarrow is the kind of person who naturally resists being put into categories. His talk to years 6, 7 and 8 today took the whole school by storm. If children entered the Hall thinking they could lie back for an easy snooze they were in for a surprise. Alex burst onto the stage full of energy, enthusiasm and witty repartee. His ‘game on’ personality had pupils on the edge of their seats within minutes and he gave a beautifully balanced presentation that covered how he got into writing, his current series ‘TimeRiders’ and questions about history. The atmosphere during the history quiz that ended the talk was electric. We sold all the author’s books we had in stock during the book sale, all the library copies are now on loan and we have orders for more books in the pipeline. It isn’t often that an author visit can compete with the enticing world of computers but this one did – and won. This is exactly the kind of author visit that inspires children to read and remains fresh in their minds for years to come."
Brighton College Prep School - Sherie New
Dear Alex,
The Forest School Pupils enjoyed your visit immensely. I had a pupil banging on the library door this morning because he wanted a signed copy of one of your books. When I glanced around the library this lunch time, several pupils were reading your books. Thank you very much for enthusing them.
We have had tremendous feedback from both pupils and teachers who came out of the hall buzzing. You certainly know how to connect with young boys even if they have never heard of “Nirvana”.
We would love to invite you back to the Forest School in a few years’ time, Time Travel permitting.
Best regards
Collette Shine 14/02/12
Alex works with the 9-14 year olds, and is comfortable giving this presentation to 400 children at a time. There is also the additional option to have Alex work with smaller groups of children giving writing workshops. Alex has an excellent rapport with the children and the children respond enthusiastically to the themes and dramatic scenarios in the books. The session finishes with a Q&A session and a book signing, where all books will be available to purchase.
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Alex's Books
**Alex signs all copies of his books purchased by students on the day of his visit**
Time Riders (Book 1)
Liam O'Connor should have died at sea in 1912. Maddy Carter should have died on a plane in 2010. Sal Vikram should have died in a fire in 2026. Yet moments before death, someone mysteriously appeared and said, ‘Take my hand . . .' But Liam, Maddy and Sal aren't rescued. They are recruited by an agency that no one knows exists, with only one purpose - to fix broken history. Because time travel is here, and there are those who would go back in time and change the past. That's why the TimeRiders exist: to protect us. To stop time travel from destroying the world . . .
The first book in the series sees our freshly recruited team thrown into the thick of it before they've had a chance to fully train. Paul Kramer, a brilliant physicist from the future, has plans to alter the past - to lead Nazi Germany to victory over the allies and to ensure an ordered World Reich under his rule.
Liam and the team's support unit, Bob, are sent back in time to try and stall Kramer's plans, whilst in the present, Maddy and Sal witness New York altered by the arrival of a time wave to a terrifying new reality - an apocalyptic landscape of ruins and the savage mutated descendents of some nuclear holocaust.
Can Liam and Bob fix history, before the mutants find the girls....and eat them?
TimeRiders: Day of the Predator (Book 2)
Liam O'Connor should have died at sea in 1912. Maddy Carter should have died on a plane in 2010. Sal Vikram should have died in a fire in 2029. But all three have been given a second chance - to work for an agency that no-one knows exists. Its purpose - to prevent time travel destroying history . . .
When Maddy mistakenly opens a time window where and when she shouldn't have, Liam is marooned sixty-five million years ago in the hunting ground of a deadly - and until now - undiscovered species of predator.
Can Liam make contact with Maddy and Sal before he's torn to pieces by dinosaurs - and without endangering history so much that the world is overtaken by a terrifying new reality?
TimeRiders: The Doomsday Code (Book 3)
Liam O'Connor should have died at sea in 1912. Maddy Carter should have died on a plane in 2010. Sal Vikram should have died in a fire in 2026. But all three have been given a second chance - to work for an agency that no one knows exists. Its purpose: to prevent time travel destroying history . . .
In 1993 British computer hacker Adam Lewis finds his name in a coded manuscript that is almost one thousand years old. How did Adam's name get in there . . . and why?
Confronted by Adam in 2001, the TimeRiders travel back to Sherwood Forest in 1193 to discover the origins of the ancient message. But when a strange hooded man appears interested in the same thing, they begin to wonder what terrible threat this cryptic link from the past holds for the future . . .
TimeRiders: The Doomsday Code (Book 3) will be available from February 2011!
To read extracts taken from Alex Scarrow's Books please visit www.scarrow.co.uk
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To Make a Booking
To make an enquiry about Alex Scarrow, or any of the other authors, poets & illustrators listed on this website, please phone Trevor Wilson on +44 (0) 1535 656015, or email him at info@authorsabroad.com
Further information on Alex Scarrow is available from www.scarrow.co.uk