SOURCE CITATION
Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2007. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2007.
Photograph provided by Penguin Books for Young Readers.
"Sidelights"
The name Anthony Horowitz is well known to young British fans of horror stories. The editor of The Puffin Book of Horror Stories, Horowitz has also chilled youngsters' blood for over a decade with such heart-stopping books as Death Walks Tonight: Killer Stories and the novels Scared and Twisted. More recently, American readers have been introduced to Horowitz through his popular series of books featuring protagonist Alex Rider, the teenage nephew of a former British secret agent who find himself thrust into a series of daring adventures. "There are times when a grade-B adventure is just the ticket for a bored teenager," maintained Booklist reviewer Jean Franklin, "especially if it offers plenty of slam-bang action, spying, and high-tech gadgets." According to Franklin, the "Alex Rider" novels Stormbreaker, Point Blanc, and Skeleton Key provide just that.
Fourteen-year-old Alex Rider makes his fiction debut in Stormbreaker. When his guardian, Uncle Ian, is killed in a car wreck, Alex questions whether the police have correctly classified the death as accidental after he finds a number of bullet holes in his uncle's car. After his curiosity over his uncle's death almost gets him killed as well, Alex discovers Ian was an agent for British Intelligence and decides that joining the agency himself might be the best way to stay alive. Leaving prep school for two weeks of intensive training as an MI6 agent, Alex is given a collection of spy gadgets and sent on his first assignment: to infiltrate a training group run by demented inventor Herod Sayles, who is trying to wipe out Great Britain's children by using biological weapons introduced through an in-school computer system known as "Stormbreaker." Noting that "satirical names abound . . . and the hard-boiled language is equally outrageous," a Publishers Weekly reviewer nonetheless wrote that "these exaggerations only add to the fun" for readers. Stormbreaker was deemed "an excellent choice for reluctant readers" by School Library Journal contributor Lynn Bryant due to its "short cliff-hanger chapters and its breathless pace."
In Point Blanc, the second installment in the "Alex Rider" series, the teen operative finds himself back in prep school, only this time it is an exclusive prep school called Point Blanc that is located in the French Alps and designed to house the young black sheep in Britain's wealthiest families. Run by a South African named Dr. Grief, the school has surprisingly good luck in making these rich teen troublemakers tow the line. But why? After Alex, now trapped at the school, discovers that brainwashing by Grief is only one of the ways these young men are controlled, he begins to worry about his own safety. Fortunately, as a Kirkus Reviews critic assured readers, "Horowitz devises a string of miraculous circumstances that keeps Alex alive and spying throughout." Propelled by hidden passages, frightening medical experiments, and a protagonist who barely stays one step away from death, Point Blanc was described by Franklin as a "non-stop thriller" in her Booklist review.
Many of Horowitz's books feature young teens who find their mundane lives suddenly turned upside down by an evil force. Such is the case in The Devil's Door-Bell, one of Horowitz's first novels for young readers. Published in 1983 as the first segment in the "Power of Five" series, it tells the story of thirteen-year-old Martin Hopkins, whose parents' tragic death forces him into the care of a foster mother named Elvira who takes him to live on her country farm in Yorkshire, England. Upset at being newly orphaned and nervous over Elvira's strange demeanor and intimations that Martin's time will also soon be up, the teen realizes that his suspicions are not just due to stress: Elvira is actually a witch, and her coven is planning something that will cause him harm. A clue left by a murdered friend leads Martin and journalist friend Richard Cole to an ancient circle of stones known as the "Devil's Door-Bell" where Elvira's plans to unleash a malevolent supernatural horror energized by a nearby nuclear power station are revealed. Calling The Devil's Door-Bell "a satisfyingly scary book," School Library Journal contributor Anne Connor added that Horowitz creates a "chilling atmosphere of horror" despite the novel's "sketchy characterization . . . and . . . unbelievable plot." As the author revealed to CA, Horowitz is rewriting The Devil's Door-Bell for a new edition.
The "Power of Five" series, which focuses on young people who are fated to do battle with the forces of an ancient evil, continues with The Night of the Scorpion. Here Martin and Richard once again find themselves forced to close a portal into hell after a mysterious explosion almost kills a group of Martin's classmates. This time the pair must travel to Peru, where their efforts to battle the demons known as the Old Ones are thwarted by human accomplices who arrest Richard as soon as he gets off the plane. Left alone in a strange country, Martin meets another boy named Pedro, a descendant of the Incas who, like Martin, is destined to do battle with the Old Ones. "Horowitz packs enough suspense and violence into the story to satisfy the most avid thriller fans," according to a Publishers Weekly contributor, while English Journal reviewer Regina Cowin noted that "the reader is drawn into this story of ancient mysticism just as inexorably as Martin and Pedro are drawn into" their battle against ancient evil. Other "Power of Five" novels include Day of the Dragon, published in 1989.
Horowitz's readers are in for even more travels through time in his novel The Devil and His Boy. Set in Elizabethan England, this 2000 novel finds a servant boy named Tom Falconer thrust into an alien world after he is ordered to accompany a friend of his master's to London, but his companion is murdered along the way. Befriended by a pickpocket named Moll, Tom joins a troupe of thespians and suddenly finds himself enmeshed in political intrigue and drawn into the illegal activities of some of his new friends. Cast in a play titled "The Devil and His Boy" which is being produced by the secretive Dr. Mobius, Tom winds up in the lap of the Queen of England herself. "Horowitz paints his characters . . . with broad strokes and keeps the melodramatic story moving at a rapid clip," wrote School Library Journal contributor Barbara Scotto, dubbing The Devil and His Boy a "rollicking good tale that is mostly based on historical fact." Ilene Cooper also cited the historical basis of the novel, adding that, "to his credit, [Horowitz] does not try to pretty up Elizabethan life for his audience. . . . dirty and disfigured characters are described in detail."
In addition to series and stand-alone novels, Horowitz has published a number of short-story collections, some as editor and some as sole author. In Horowitz Horror: Nine Nasty Stories to Chill You to the Bone and its sequel, More Horowitz Horror: Eight Sinister Stories You'll Wish You'd Never Read, readers can consider themselves forewarned. Noting that "none will disappoint readers with an appetite for ghoulish happenings," School Librarian reviewer Peter Hollindale praised several stories included in the second of the two books, commending Horowitz's creative use of irony, subtlety, and "creepy and surprising variants on familiar themes."
Writing children's books is only one of several areas where Horowitz has used his writing talents; the other is in authoring series and segments for British television, an activity that has helped Horowitz the novelist imbue his stories with a strong cinematic sense and draw even reluctant readers into his tales of horror and suspense. He also oftentimes includes film references in his books, particularly in his "Diamond Brothers" series about the P.I. brothers who star in such novels as The Falcon's Malteser, Public Enemy Number Two, and South by South East. Calling the books "rattling good yarns," Jo Goodman noted in a Magpies review that "South by South East contains, amongst others, the windmill scene from [Hitchcock's film] Foreign Correspondent and the crop duster from North by Northwest." The Falcon's Malteser references the classic film The Maltese Falcon starring Humphrey Bogart, while Public Enemy Number Two is a take-off on the gangster film Public Enemy Number One.
Horowitz told CA: "It seems that kids who don't like to read love my books! They're written for anyone who loves adventure, excitement, humor, and non-stop action. Stormbreaker and Point Blank, which are about a fourteen-year-old spy, were both inspired by James Bond, and when you read my books I hope you'll be able to 'see' them--to imagine them as movies. I write a lot for television and the cinema too, particularly horror and murder mystery. There is a dark side to my writing, but mainly I believe in having fun."
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Family: Born April 5, 1955, in London, England; son of Mark (a lawyer) and Joyce Horowitz; married Jill Green (a television producer), April 15, 1988; children: Nicholas, Cassian. Education: Attended Rugby school; University of York, B.A. Addresses: Office: c/o Greenlit Productions, 13 D'Arblay St., London W1, England. Agent: Peters, Fraser & Dunlop, 34-43 Russell St., London WC2B 5HP, England. E-mail: ajhorowitz@aol.com.
AWARDS
Great Britain's Red House Children's Book Award, 2003, for Skeleton Key; Rebecca Caudill Young Readers' Book Award, 2004, for Stormbreaker.
CAREER
Writer.
