Jan Mark

Handles

Jan Mark

• 1983 Carnegie winner
• Score: 10.33

Bored with her holiday in the country, motorcycle buff Erica Timperley discovers an unusual motorcycle repair shop where she meets Elsie Wainwright, Bunny, Bill Birdcycle, the Greenlin and other colourful characters. By the end of her holiday Erica has discovered that even vegetables can be interesting, if you approach them in the right way, that there may be more to a name than she ever thought possible and that it is not enough to have a name - you have to have a handle too.

Thunder and Lightnings

Jan Mark

• 1976 Carnegie winner
• Score: 10.26

Victor was the oldest boy Andrew had ever met. How could he be so dim in school and yet know so much about aeroplanes? As their friendship grows; Andrew becomes more and more concerned about what will happen when Victor discovers that the Lightnings planes he loves so much are to be scrapped and replaced.

Turbulence

Jan Mark

• 2007 Carnegie shortlist
• Score: 6.57

Clay is a normal teenager who likes watching films with her Dad and doing her paper round. But when a new neighbour befriends her Mum, she starts to feel uneasy. Since when did their lives revolve around his and why is everything suddenly so complicated. Clay knows there is something odd about the new family, yet she can't help being drawn to them like everyone else...

The Eclipse of the Century

Jan Mark

• 2000 Guardian Award shortlist
• Score: 6.5

A young man has a near-death experience and finds himself at the end of a long tunnel. He is greeted by strangers who say they are expecting him "under a black sun at the end of a thousand years" and that the place is called Qantoum. He discovers that Qantoum is a town in deepest Asia.

Useful Idiots

Jan Mark

• 2004 Guardian Award longlist
• Score: 4.54

Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or a carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. The mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure - Francis Bacon.

Set in a highly realistic dystopic future, where the lowlands of Britain are flooded, this beautifully-realised novel explores a world where archaeology is banned for fear of social unrest. One bleak morning, a storm across the North Sea unveils a human skull, which is to precipitate a series of events that changes the lives of those involved. And it is the Inglish, a remnant tribe eking out an existence on the edge of Europe, who will be affected the most. This is a compelling vision of England as it might be in the not-so-distant future.

Heathrow Nights

Jan Mark

• 2001 Guardian Award longlist
• Score: 4.51

What do you do if you get banned from the school trip for disrupting a performance of Shakespeare's Hamlet, and you don't want to tell your parents? The solution for Russell and his mates is to hide out in London. But when their plans go wrong, Russell is left alone with his thoughts. How can he cope with his father's death? Why did his mother remarry so quickly? Does he have to get on with his step-dad? Sleeping rough, Russell has plenty of time to think about life, death and Hamlet...at Heathrow Airport.