John Christopher Resources

The writer

‘A comforting glass of whisky’ In 1999 Colin Brockhurst interviewed Sam Youd, covering an extensive range of topics from his admiration of Jane Austen and John Wyndham, his early ‘single-draft’ writing method, his shift from...

Early sci-fi

The Fantast Sam Youd brought out the first issue of the scifi magazine, The Fantast, shortly after his 17th birthday in April 1939 and continued publishing it until March 1941, when military service brought his...

"The Death of Grass" "No Blade of Grass"

Adult fiction

Far more than writing stories Poet Alex Ness (Poplitiko) contemplates three scifi writers ‘who are worth seeking’. ‘John Christopher was a serious mind,’ he writes, ‘but for a portion of his career he considered serious...

Fiction for young adults

Striking the balance between naive optimism and bleak nihilism Grognardia was introduced to The White Mountains by the comic-strip version which ran in Boy’s Life in the early 1980s. “As a kid,” he writes, “I...