Cynthia Harnett


Cynthia Harnett was an English author and illustrator, mainly of children's books. She is best known for six historical novels that feature ordinary teenage children involved in events of national significance, four of them in the 15th century. They are characterised by meticulous background research and vivid evocation of history.
For one of them, The Wool-Pack, she won the Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject. Another, The Load of Unicorn, was a commended runner-up for the Carnegie Medal.

Life

Cynthia Harnett was born in London and studied at Chelsea School of Art. She illustrated the early editions of several of her own novels, but she also collaborated more than a dozen times with the painter and etcher George Vernon Stokes. Several of their books about dogs, the countryside or both credit Stokes and Harnett as co-authors.

Works

;With Vernon StokesIn Praise of Dogs: An Anthology in Prose and Verse, compiled by C.M. Harnett, illustrated by George Vernon Stokes David's New World: The Making of a Sportsman The Pennymakers Junk, the Puppy Banjo the Puppy Velvet Nasks, illus. Vernon Stokes To Be A Farmer's Boy Mudlarks Mountaineers Ducks and Drakes The Bob-Tail Pup Sand Hoppers Getting to Know Dogs, illus. Vernon Stokes Two and a Bit Follow my Leader Pets Limited
;Historical novels
These six books were published by Methuen and the first five were illustrated by Harnett.The Great House —set in London and the countryside in the 17th century The Wool-Pack —set in the Cotswolds in 1493 Ring Out Bow Bells! —set in London in 1415 Stars of Fortune —set in 1554, about the Washington family, of Sulgrave Manor in Northants, England; and their stars-and-stripes coat of arms; ancestors of George WashingtonThe Load of Unicorn —set in London in 1482The Writing on the Hearth, illus. Gareth Floyd —set in the 1430s
In the U.S. these six books were first published as
The Great House,
Nicholas and the Wool-Pack,
The Drawbridge Gate,
Stars of Fortune,
Caxton's Challenge,
and The Writing on the Hearth.
At least three were re-titled again in the 1980s.
;OthersThe Green Popinjay A Fifteenth-Century Wool Merchant Monasteries & Monks, illus. Edward Osmond