Jane Stemp

Jane Stemp was born in Lewisham in 1961 and grew up with her parents and two brothers in Surrey. She has cerebral palsy, and spent much of her childhood and early teens in hospital. She took a degree in English at Somerville College Oxford, before training as a librarian in Aberystwyth. After working in Oxford University libraries for twelve years she married Robin in 1999, and now lives with him and several thousand books in a house in Somerset. Her current job, however, is with the Navy in Hampshire.

Jane started writing poetry when she was eleven and fiction when she was seventeen. Her first novels, Waterbound and Secret Songs, were shortlisted for the NASEN (National Association for Special Educational Needs) Children's Book Award. Secret Songs, partly inspired by her own experience of hearing loss, was also shortlisted for the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.