Elaine Horseman
{{Short description|British children's writer}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2015}}
{{Use British English|date=December 2015}}
{{Expand German|topic=bio|date=October 2016|Elaine Horseman}}
{{more citations needed|date=February 2013}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Elaine Horseman
| birth_name = Elaine Hall
| birth_place = Lichfield, Staffordshire, England, UK
| death_place = Bristol, England, UK
| birth_date = 23 November 1925
| death_date = April 1999
| nationality = British
| occupation = Writer
| genre = Children's fantasy novels
| period =
}}
Elaine Horseman née Hall (23 November 1925 – April 1999) was a British author of three children's books, which centre on five children in an old victorian house and their experiences with a book of magic spells. Horseman's first novel Hubble's Bubble was published first in England and in Germany, France, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Spain and Portugal.
Life
Elaine Hall was born in 1925 in Lichfield, Staffordshire to Harold Hall, a Vicar Choral, and Olive E. Bowey. She was the second of nine children and "grew up in a house very like the Hubbles', in the Cathedral Close at Lichfield in Staffordshire".Author information on the dust jacket of The Hubbles and the Robot, first edition. In 1950 she married Leslie A. Horseman, a computer applications engineer, with whom she moved to Bristol and had two sons: Stephen Thomas and Christopher Michael. She became qualified as a teacher at the University of Birmingham and worked as a primary school teacher from 1944, before she gave up teaching in 1962 in order to write.
Of the second Hubbles or Boffins Club book, the American journal Kirkus Reviews complemented the easy transitions between fantasy and reality and observed that the children "keep up a steady banter often pleasantly silly, frequently affected, and always very British."
Horseman died in Bristol, April 1999.{{citation needed|date=August 2013}}
Works
- Hubble's Bubble, illustrated by John Sergeant (Chatto & Windus, 1964); US ed., 1964, {{LCCN|64020786}}
- The Hubbles' Treasure Hunt, illus. Sergeant (Chatto & Windus, 1965); US ed., 1966, {{LCCN|66011773}}
- The Hubbles and the Robot, illus. Sergeant (Chatto & Windus, 1968)
The Boffins' Club comprises the Hubbles -- 12-year-old Alaric and his 8-year-old sister, Sarah, who live with their eccentric grandfather in the town of Stoweminster -- together with Charlotte, Jonathan and Peter Vaughan who arrive for a holiday. In the first novel, Hubble's Bubble, Alaric discovers a book of ancient spells and, with Sarah's help, turns himself into a cat.{{cite web | url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/a/elaine-orseman/hubbles-bubble/ | title=Book Reviews, Sites, Romance, Fantasy, Fiction }}
In The Hubbles' Treasure Hunt, the Boffins Club goes on to experiments three and six in the book. A clue to treasure buried during the English Civil War leads them to try the third experiment, which allows travel back in time. The sixth experiment makes it possible to breathe under water, when a prehistoric mammal, found on another trip into history, becomes lost.{{cite web | url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/a/elaine-horseman/the-hubbles-treasure-hunt/ | title=Book Reviews, Sites, Romance, Fantasy, Fiction }}
In The Hubbles and the Robot, Alaric Hubble brings back a robot housemaid from the 23rd Century.{{cite web | url=https://www.abebooks.com/book-search/author/elaine-horseman/first-edition/ | title=Elaine Horseman, First Edition - AbeBooks }}
References
{{reflist |25em |refs=
{{cite book |last1=Reginald|first1=R |last2=Menville|first2=Douglas |last3=Burgess|first3=Mary |title=Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature, volume 2 |date=September 2010 |publisher=Wildside Press LLC |page=942 |isbn=9780941028776}}
{{cite web |url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/elaine-horseman/the-hubbles-treasure-hunt/|title=THE HUBBLES' TREASURE HUNT by Elaine Horseman |work=Kirkus Reviews |date=28 March 1966 |access-date=19 February 2013}}
}}
External links
{{Portal bar |Children's literature |Fantasy |United Kingdom }}
- {{isfdb name|204426}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Horseman, Elaine}}
Category:20th-century English novelists
Category:20th-century British short story writers
Category:20th-century English women writers
Category:Alumni of the University of Birmingham
Category:British women science fiction and fantasy writers
Category:British women short story writers
Category:English women novelists
Category:English children's writers
Category:English fantasy writers
Category:People from Lichfield