The final book in William Nicholson’s award-winning epic fantasy series, Wind on Fire.
`Gloriously cinematic and completely enthralling’ – Independent
In the time of cruelty, the Manth people march back to their homeland. Ira Hath is the only one who knows the way, but she is dying. Bowman eagerly awaits his calling to join the Singer people, but when Kestrel is taken by bandits, he must use his powers to find her. Together they fight, until their destinies tear them apart. And all the while they wait for the wind to rise. Only one will sing the firesong . . .
Fantasy books for children don’t get more spectacular than Firesong. Since first publication, William Nicholson’s Wind on Fire trilogy has been translated into over 25 languages and won prizes including the Blue Peter Book Award and Smarties Prize Gold Award.
One of the greatest writers of our time, William Nicholson’s has not only sold millions of children’s books worldwide, he also written for the screen and the stage, including the Oscar-winning film Gladiator and the BAFTA-winning play Shadowlands.
William Nicholson was born in 1948, and grew up in Sussex and Gloucestershire. He was educated at Downside School and Christ’s College, Cambridge, and then joined BBC Television, where he worked as a documentary film maker. There his ambition to write, directed first into novels, was channeled into television drama. His plays for television include Shadowlands and Life Story , both of which won the BAFTA Best Television Drama award in their year; other award-winners were Sweet As You Are and The March . In 1988 he received the Royal Television Society’s Writer’s Award. His first play, an adaptation of Shadowlands for the stage, was Evening Standard Best Play of 1990, and went on to a Tony Award winning run on Broadway. He was nominated for an Oscar for the screenplay of the film version, which was directed by Richard Attenborough and starred Anthony Hopkins and Debra Winger.
Since then he has written more films – Sarafina, Nell, First Knight, Grey Owl , Gladiator (as co-writer), for which he received a second Oscar nomination, Elizabeth: the Golden Age, Les Miserables, and Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. He has written and directed his own film, Firelight; and four further stage plays, Map of the Heart, Katherine Howard, The Retreat from Moscow , which ran for five months on Broadway and received three Tony Award nominations, and Crash.
His fantasy novel for older children, The Wind Singer, won the Smarties Prize Gold Award on publication in 2000, and the Blue Peter Book of the Year Award in 2001. Its sequel, Slaves of the Mastery , was published in 2001, and the final volume in the trilogy, Firesong , in 2002. The trilogy has been sold in every major foreign market, from the US to China.
His second sequence of fantasy novels is called The Noble Warriors. The first book is Seeker (2005), the second book, Jango (2006) and the third book Noman (2007).
His love-and-sex novel for teens, Rich and Mad, was published in 2010.
His novels for adults are The Society of Others (2004), The Trial of True Love (2005), The Secret Intensity of Everyday Life (2009), All the Hopeful Lovers (2010) The Golden Hour (2011), Motherland (2013) and Reckless (2014).
He lives in Sussex with his wife, the social historian Virginia Nicholson, and their three children.
