I AM A SOLDIER. I AM AT WAR. Seven-year-old Chris and Imran are sworn blood brothers. Ten years on they are treading seperate paths. The spectre of terrorism has wrecked their friendship. It has changed their lives and could even end them. A story of two ordinary boys growing up in an extraordinary time - our time. A time of terror, when atrocities don't happen in the TV reports about people in far away places. Rioting, fighting, maiming, and killing are happening here, on our doorstep.
Author
Alan Gibbons is an author of children's books and a Blue Peter Book Award. He currently lives in Liverpool, England, where he used to teach in a primary school. His father was a farm laborer, but was hurt in an accident when Alan was eight years old. The family had to move to Crewe, Cheshire where Alan experienced bullying for the first time. He began to write for his pupils as a teacher, but never tried to get any of his work published. Gibbons trained to be a teacher in his mid-thirties and starting writing short stories for his students. Later, he began to write professionally. In 2000, he won the Blue Peter Book Award in the category "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 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 and the Salford Librarians' Special Award.
