Angela has written extensively for the Oxford University Press Reading Tree Programme (mostly for the award-winning Readerful series). She has recently written two Stories for Maths titles. Scareground, her middle-grade novel was published in 2023 and nominated for the Historical Association’s Young Quills Award (Best Historical Fiction for Children). Angela teaches creative writing worldwide to children and adults, and will reopen her booking list in September. Hobbledown, the award-winning adventure park, is based on her children’s book of the same title.

In Teachers, Schools and Views on Education, John Howson brings together a year of sharp, timely reflections on the English education system at a moment of rapid change. Written as events unfolded, these commentaries capture the pressures facing teachers, the shifting demands on schools, and the policy decisions that shaped the national conversation throughout 2013.

With his trademark clarity and deep understanding of the teacher labour market, Howson offers readers a grounded, insightful narrative that connects policy to practice and national debate to classroom reality. From recruitment challenges to governance reforms, from curriculum shifts to workforce morale, this book provides a rare contemporaneous record of a pivotal year.

Essential reading for educators, policymakers, researchers, and anyone seeking to understand how the forces of policy and practice interact, this volume stands as both a historical document and a lens through which to view today’s ongoing debates.

I have been a writer of fiction for many years, initially as a short story writer for women’s magazines when I was published extensively, nationally and internationally.

After completing an M.A. in Creative Writing, I turned to full length fiction and have now written four novels with a fifth close to completion. My novels are character driven – their genre is book group/commercial/literary crossover with themes of the complexities of family life, relationships and the influence of the past upon present lives. Set in the latter years of the 20th century and the opening decade of the 21st, each novel is a standalone story.

My fifth novel is something of a departure for me: set in London during WW2 with themes of conscientious objection as well as duty and familial obligation, it is my first venture into what can be considered historic fiction.

In addition to writing, I run creative writing classes and workshops and enjoy speaking to a wide range of societies and groups about my creative process and my long writing career.

Sylvia named Coopers Oxford Marmalade Factory, ‘the Jam Factory’ when she established an Art and Antiques Centre with café, bookshop and repair services. The name has stuck! She’s best known locally for the ten year Oxford Castaway series in The Oxford Times. It brought together people who would usually never meet and she made it diverse which was rare then. Her novel, Sculpting the Elephant, is half set in Jericho and half in India. Sylvia is a campaigner for libraries and recently, with friends and the help of Korky Paul raised the money to build the first community library in west Kenya where her novel Not so Black and White is partly set. Her best-selling Brushstrokes in Time is a historical novel which tells the story of the courageous Stars artists (Beijing 1979). Her memoir has been endorsed by the journalist, Yasmin Alibhai Brown, the international poet Sudeep Sen and the history professor, Rana Mitter (Oxford and Harvard).

Steve has spent his life trying to discover the secret of how to become a fully-functioning adult. He has so far failed. One thing he has learnt is that he ought to have tried writing a book forty years earlier than he did, although he also now realises that he should have become a celebrity first, as this would have made selling it much easier.

He currently has three comedy spy thrillers to his name, all published by Claret Press: A Very Important Teapot, set in Australia; Bored to Death in the Baltics, not set in Australia; and Poor Table Manners, which takes place in Cape Town. These feature an initially fairly hapless hero, Dawson, and a considerably less hapless heroine, Lucy, together with varied supporting casts, most of whom are not who they claim to be.

In 2025, Steve also released into the world a comedy-murder-mystery, Lazytown, set in an eccentric Oxfordshire village. And, in a departure from comedy, a UK based thriller, False Connections, featuring ex-MI5 agent, Mel Milano, may well be out before the summer book fair. This could be the first of a new series, although Dawson and Lucy are also planning another outing at some point.

Enthralling. Inspiring. Impossible to forget. Epic Tales creates books, resources, and live storytelling experiences that have inspired many children to fall in love with reading, helped others overcome anxiety and related issues, and put smiles on the faces of entire families. Our work draws on decades of professional storytelling, school visits, teacher training, and Reading for Pleasure expertise.