KARLEEN BRADFORD was born in Toronto, Ontario, but left Canada when she was nine years old to live in Argentina with her parents. She returned to attend the University of Toronto, graduating with a B.A. in English and Languages. She married a young Geography student, who then turned into a Trade Commissioner with the Canadian Government, and they spent the next 34 years living in various countries around the world. Many of her books are set in these locales. She is now back in Canada permanently, living on the shores of Georgian Bay, in Owen Sound, Ontario. She has three children, four grandchildren, and a lovable giant of a German Shepherd named Casey.
Her most recent books are The Scarlet Cross and Angeline, which are the final two books in a five book series about the crusades. The first book in the series, There Will be Wolves, won the Canadian Library Association Young Adult Book Award for 1993, was shortlisted for the 1993 Manitoba Young Readers' Choice Award, was chosen as an American Library Association Best Book of the Year for 1996 and was selected as one of the 100 best Canadian books for young children and young adults by the librarians of the Canadian Library Association. The second book in the series, is Shadows on a Sword, and the third is Lionheart's Scribe. All of these books have been nominated for numerous awards. Other books include two books in a proposed fantasy series for young adults, Dragonfire and Whisperings of Magic. She is currently at work on the third, Dragonmaster. She has written a book in the Scholastic Dear Canada Series, called With Nothing But Our Courage, the Loyalist Diary of Mary Macdonald, a picture book, You Can't Rush a Cat, and a second grade level early reader, Ghost Wolf, several of which have also been nominated for awards.
Early books include The Nine Days Queen, reissued in the Scholastic Under the Crown Series; Animal Heroes; A Different Kind of Champion; Thirteenth Child, finalist for the 1996 Blue Heron Award; Windward Island, winner of the 1990 Max and Greta Ebel Award, runner-up for the 1990 City of Dartmouth Award, and shortlisted for the 1992 Manitoba Young Readers' Choice Award; Write Now!, How to Turn Your Ideas into Great Stories; The Haunting at Cliff House; The Stone in the Meadow; I Wish There Were Unicorns; The Other Elizabeth, winner of the 1979 CommCept Award; and Wrong Again, Robbie, originally published under the title A Year for Growing.
When Karleen is not writing she enjoys reading, swimming, quilting and hiking the Bruce Trail between Owen Sound and Tobermory at the tip of the Bruce Peninsula.
