Background
Joan Delano Aiken was born on September 4, 1924 in Rye, Sussex, England to Conrad Potter and Jessie (MacDonald) Aiken.
With husband, Ron Brown, 1945
Living in the bus, 1952: (from left) Joan, Liz, John, and Ron
The author in the United States, 1972
(This black comedy is set in Venice on a film set and in a...)
This black comedy is set in Venice on a film set and in a Greek fishing village recreated on the Devon coast and is written by the author of many thrillers, historical novels and a sequel to Jane Austen's "Mansfield Park". Her last novel was "Deception".
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385260210/?tag=2022091-20
(When Arun's mother mysteriously disappears, Is Twite is u...)
When Arun's mother mysteriously disappears, Is Twite is unable to get any information from the Silent Sect she to which she belonged, and in the wake of a smuggling operation, the cousins face two evil villains.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385321821/?tag=2022091-20
(Is (short for Isabett) Twite is the younger sister of Did...)
Is (short for Isabett) Twite is the younger sister of Dido, every bit as spunky and compelling as her older sibling and with the same habit of attracting bizarre adventures. The two unputdownable novels in which she is the heroine, "Is" and "Cold Shoulder Road", are published here in a wonderfully satisfying double volume. Is, travelling north to find a lost cousin, discovers an underground kingdom where children work as slaves in horrifying conditions, under the rule of the sinister Gold Kingy. A year or two on, with Simon Battersea now on the throne, her aunt Ruth Twite disappears from Cold Shoulder Road. Is needs all her courage and resourcefulness as she encounters the vicious gang of Merrie Gentry and other alarming forces that are at work across the country.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0099477386/?tag=2022091-20
( The Paget family is irrevocably changed in this Regency...)
The Paget family is irrevocably changed in this Regency period romance reissue from legendary author Joan Aiken New bride Fanny Paget experiences shame and torment in her loveless arranged marriage, finding solace only in her budding friendship with estate gardener Andrew Talgarth. He never seems too busy to listen and sympathize. But Fanny is trapped, until her husband's cousins arrive from India and a series of explosive events unfold that change the lives of all involved. Andrew is there through it all, strong and steadfast, awaiting Fanny's greatest self-discovery-no matter how long it takes. What readers say: "Romance and high adventure flow at a rapid pace!" "Cracking entertainment, with lots of romance and thrills." "A fast, satisfying read." "Vivid and vibrant!"
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0446906816/?tag=2022091-20
(This is a poignant exploration of a young lady's enduranc...)
This is a poignant exploration of a young lady's endurance in the face of reduced circumstances, and in true Jane Austen fashion, there is an admirable hero to make all right in the end.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FFBN56A/?tag=2022091-20
( Jane Austen's Emma has been a favorite novel for Austen...)
Jane Austen's Emma has been a favorite novel for Austenites since 1816. In the mid-1990s it became a favorite movie for millions of new admirers. A key reason for Emma's success is that the story has two heroines-Emma Woodhouse and Jane Fairfax. In Austen's novel, Jane's backgound is left obscure, and the turmoil underlying her current reduced circumstances in mysterious. At last we learn her whole story in Joan Aiken's superb retelling of Emma-this time from Jane Fairfax's point of view. When Jane Fairfax was published in hardcover, Aiken's wit, style, and skill prompted Booklist to say, "Brilliant...extraordinarily will done and highly recommended." This worthy companion to the great original is for the first time now available in paperback.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/031215707X/?tag=2022091-20
Joan Delano Aiken was born on September 4, 1924 in Rye, Sussex, England to Conrad Potter and Jessie (MacDonald) Aiken.
Joan Aiken was surrounded by literary models from birth. At the age of five she decided upon a literary career and began writing her first stories and poems. Her first acceptance came while she was still in school; two of her poems were published in a prestigious little magazine, the Abinger Chronicle, edited by E. M. Forster, Sylvia Sprigge, and Max Beerbohm. Although they paid her, Aiken was made to realize poetry was not a gainful occupation.
Aiken continued to develop her writing after her marriage to journalist Ron Brown, selling several radio scripts and some short stories. When Brown’s death in 1955 left her with large debts and two children to support, she went to work as an editor for the short story magazine Argosy. To supplement her editor’s wages,' she also contributed many short stories to this publication and others. These stories, collected in the volumes More Than You Bargained For and All You've Ever Wanted, became Aiken’s first published books. But writing short stories was beginning to feel like a waste of time when she could be writing longer works of fiction for greater returns on expended efforts. With that goal in mind she unearthed the manuscript of a novel written at the age of seventeen. Carefully revised, that manuscript became her first published novel, The Kingdom and the Cave.
Aiken began creating her scrambled history of England in her next novel, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. Here she introduced what would become the standard elements of several of her novels: an English countryside terrorized by wolves, a colorful London underworld, the Stuart King James III, and the Hanoverian rebels determined to assassinate him. Although The Wolves of Willoughby Chase was marketed as a children’s book, it was read and enjoyed by adults as well. Its success enabled Aiken to devote herself to writing full time.
The books Is Underground and Cold Shoulder Road continue the saga. In Is Underground, Is Twite sets off for London in search of her missing cousin Arun. There she is enticed to join other children on a journey to a fantasy Playland. But the destination turns out to be an underground city filled with child slaves laboring in mines and factories.
Aiken’s horror and suspense stories have been as highly praised as her fantasy adventures. Aiken’s ghost stories, too, have eerie and suspenseful qualities. Each of the stories in Foot in the Grave, states Publishers Weekly, “are unmistakably scary, with no recourse to false happy endings.” All of the classic British stories in Aiken’s A Fit of Shivers have elements of the unexplained-haunted houses, ancient curses, second sight, ghosts-and plots with ironic twists. Similarly, The Winter Sleepwalker contains strange and often humorous stories with varied themes and moods, while in A Creepy Company Aiken again creates believable characters, locations, and situations that are eerie.
Eliza's Daughter is a sequel to Austen’s Sense and Sensibility in which Aiken tells the story of Eliza, the ille-gitimate daughter of Colonel Brandon’s ward. Unlike Sense and Sensibility, this novel employs a first-person narrator and has bolder women.
Aiken died at home at the age of 79 in 2004.
( The Paget family is irrevocably changed in this Regency...)
(This black comedy is set in Venice on a film set and in a...)
(When Arun's mother mysteriously disappears, Is Twite is u...)
(This is a poignant exploration of a young lady's enduranc...)
(Is (short for Isabett) Twite is the younger sister of Did...)
( Jane Austen's Emma has been a favorite novel for Austen...)
Joan had a liberal political views.
Quotes from others about the person
According to Sarah V. Clere, writing in Dictionary of Literary Biography, Aiken is “one of the most prolific and energetic of living authors.” However, “the sheer number of Aiken’s books, many of them admittedly written to formula to entertain the reader and support the writer, has hindered an appreciation of her full stature as a serious writer. Nevertheless,” Clere continues, “her best work goes beyond mere entertainment to affirm values like courage, resourcefulness, and kindness. Her children’s novels especially show that fast-paced entertainment is compatible with serious thematic development, for undergirding the high-spirited adventure of her best fiction is a bedrock of humane values.”
Joan married Ronald George Brown, a journalist, on July 7, 1945. After his death she married Julius Goldstein, a painter, on September 2, 1976. She had two children from first marriage, John Sebastian, Elizabeth Delano.