Melvin Burgess was born in 1954 and was brought up in Sussex and Berkshire. He started writing in his twenties, and wrote on and off for fifteen years before having his first book, THE CRY OF THE WOLF, published in 1990. In 1997 his controversial bestseller JUNK won the Guardian Children's Fiction Award and the Carnegie Medal. It was also shortlisted for the 1998 Whitbread Children's Book of the Year. Four of his novels have been shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal: THE CRY OF THE WOLF, AN ANGEL FOR MAY, THE BABY AND FLY PIE and THE GHOST BEHIND THE WALL. Melvin Burgess now writes full-time and lives in Hebden Bridge. The Guardian has described him as the godfather of YA fiction.