William Nicholson is a prolific English screenwriter, playwright, and television and film director twice nominated for Oscars: once for his script of Shadowlands, about the late-in-life love of British philosopher C. S. Lewis, and again for his screenplay for the 2000 blockbuster Gladiator. Other movies from Nicholson's pen include Sarafina!, Nell, First Knight, and Firelight, the last which he also directed. Television credits include the Home Box Office presentations A Private Matter and Crime of the Century, while for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) he has scripted award-winning dramas including Life Story, Sweet as You Are, and The March. Nicholson took everyone by surprise, however, with The Wind Singer, published in 2000, as he turned his hand to young adult fiction in a futuristic first book of "The Wind on Fire" trilogy that earned him a prestigious Nestle Smarties Gold Award. Subsequent volumes in the trilogy are Slaves of the...