Robert Atkinson Westall[1] (7 October 1929 – 15 April 1993) was an English author and teacher known for fiction aimed at children and young people.
[8] From 1953 until 1955, Westall did national service in the British Army as a Lance Corporal in the Royal Corps of Signals.
He returned to its setting in Garmouth, a fictionalised Tynemouth, in other novels, including The Watch House (1977) and Fathom Five (1979), which continues the Machine Gunners story.
[8] He became the inspiration for The Devil on the Road (1978), commended for the Carnegie Medal,[9] and for a short story in The Haunting of Chas McGill (1983).
[11] He finally won the once-in-a-lifetime Guardian Children's Fiction Prize for The Kingdom by the Sea (Methuen, 1990).
[3] At the time of his death, he lived in lodgings with his landlady, Lindy McKinnel, at 1 Woodland Avenue in the village of Lymm.
[13] Previously he had lived at 20 Winnington Lane, Northwich and run Magpie Antiques, Church Street, Davenham.
Tributes were paid by former teaching colleagues and Miriam Hodgson, editorial director (fiction) of Reed Children's Books.