(Fifteen-year-old Callum, recently arrived from Scotland, ...)
Fifteen-year-old Callum, recently arrived from Scotland, finds comfort in the friendship of a half-starved dog and gains the courage to face life in the New World
(Forced by the Second World War to grow up before their ti...)
Forced by the Second World War to grow up before their time, a fourteen-year-old Ellen Logan and a young British pilot Stephen Dearborn discover that sometimes falling apart is only steps away from falling in love
An Ocean Apart: The Gold Mountain Diary of Chin Mei-Ling
(Each fictional diary invites readers into the world of a ...)
Each fictional diary invites readers into the world of a girl living through a particular period in Canada's past. Gillian Chan's latest addition illustrates the effect the Chinese Head Tax has on one young girl and her family.
(When sixteen-year-old Ben Larsson is forced to move to Lo...)
When sixteen-year-old Ben Larsson is forced to move to London with his estranged father after his mother's death, unexplained events begin to happen and an ancient force begins to lure him into nearby woods
(Giving a sobering look at the realities of the War of 181...)
Giving a sobering look at the realities of the War of 1812, the book's author skillfully depicts the transformation of an impetuous young boy, full of boyish enthusiasm, into a more realistic young man who emerges on the other side of war
Gillian Chan is a British-born Canadian writer. Her works vary from short stories for children and youth to history novels, including the fiction ones.
Background
Gillian Chan was born on March 29, 1954, in Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire, United Kingdom. She is a daughter of Jimmy Durrant, a military man in the Royal Air Force, and Patricia Durrant.
Gillian spent childhood and youth in travelling following her father in his military missions around England and Europe.
Reading was a favorite leisure for every member in the family, including her two elder brothers. So, Chan developed an interest for books and writing very early. She stated that she was going to create her first book at the age of five. Among her preferences were science fiction and fantasy.
Education
Following her military father in his missions, Gillian Chan changed schools every two or three years. As a teenager, she studied at Orange Hill Girls Grammar School for in Burnt Oak suburb of London and Rochester Grammar School in Rochester, Kent.
In 1976, she entered the University of East Anglia where she obtained a Bachelor of Education degree in for years.
After moving to Canada in 1990, Chan attended the writing courses at McMaster University and Humber College also known as the Humber Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning. One of her instructors at the latter institution was a novelist and playwright Paul Quarrington.
At the beginning of her professional career, Gillian Chan did a variety of jobs, including the posts in stores, banks, and restaurants. Later, she became a teacher of English and drama in a high school in Norfolk, United Kingdom where she also ran a library.
Tired after classes, Chan had difficulties to find time for her writings. Although, she partly realized her author’s ambitions proposing to the students the pieces from the texts she had written herself.
The turning point in Chan’s career came after her marriage. In 1990, she and her husband Henry changed their place of living and moved to Ontario, Canada. Their plan to earn money from a book store fell down because of the recession. It was then when Gillian Chan made a strong decision to start up her writing career. Her first book of short stories, ‘Golden Girl and Other Stories’, was published by Kids Can Press in 1994. The collection related in the first person by five different characters who attend the same high school received favorable reviews. Chan was so caught up in the lives of the Elmwood High students that she published a sequel two year later. ‘Glory Days and Other Stories’ featured other students at the same school, and occasionally mentioned the kids introduced in Golden Girl.
In 2001, Gillian Chan applied her long-time passion of history and mythology to her writings and created a historical fantasy collection called ‘The Carved Box’. Other historical novels, an ‘Ocean Apart: the Gold Mountain Diary of Chin Mei-ling’ and ‘The Turning’ which came three and four years later. Then, the author contributed to the Scholastic series ‘I Am Canada’ publishing a couple of historical novels called ‘I Am Canada: A Call to Battle’ and ‘I Am Canada: Defend or Die’ based on the realities of the World War II.
One of the latest works of Chan issued in 2017 by Annick Press was a contemporary novel ‘The Disappearance’.
Nowadays, Gillian Chan lives and works in Dundas, Ontario, Canada.
Achievements
Gillian Chan is a talented author whose short stories for young generation and historical fiction novels are both recognized by readers and critics.
Chan was a many time nominee and finalist of such awards as Hamilton Arts Council Literary Awards, the Mr. Christie’s Book Award, the Governor General's Award, the Shining Willow Award, and the Red Maple Award.
