Penelope Farmer's writings are widely varied: she has written books for children in the primary grades (including contemporary realistic fiction, historical fiction, and mythological retellings), fantasies for older children, and, most recently, novels for adults. Farmer confesses to a lifelong love of fantasy; as a child she loved to read--in addition to fairy tales--the works of Eric Linklater, Mary Norton, C. S. Lewis, Philippa Pearce, and Lucy Boston. Farmer notes that fantasy allows the writer to "make metaphors for life ... turn it into narrative--and thereby get at the essences of life and death, which children need to be told no less than anyone." Although she has dabbled in several types of fiction, she invariably returns to fantasy, the genre of her most significant work.

Penelope Farmer was born in Westerham, Kent, on 14 June 1939 to Hugh Robert MacDonald and Penelope Boothby Farmer. She was the younger of fraternal twins...