Biography
After graduating from Oxford University, where she read Politics, Philosophy and Economics, Linda Davies became an investment banker. She continued this career for seven years, working in New York, London, Paris, Milan and Eastern Europe, before finally escaping to write financial thrillers. Writing is now her beloved second career
Five of Linda’s novels have been published globally, and have sold millions of copies worldwide. These books are rip-roaring adventures, set in the world of international finance, narco-trafficking and terrorism, where the heroine gets lots of action and drama as well as the man!
Film rights to her novel, Nest of Vipers, have also been sold.
As well as writing novels, Linda also writes for The Times, Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph, Independent and the Guardian newspapers in the UK, and the National Theatre. She is a winner of the Philip Geddes Memorial Prize for journalism.
Linda now lives in Dubai and is married to financier Rupert Wise. They have three children. It was Linda’s children who inspired her to write Sea Djinn, her first novel for children which is part of her five-book Djinn series.
Life has a strange way of mimicking art, and while writing Sea Djinn, Linda and her husband were kidnapped at sea by the Iranian navy. They were held hostage for two terrifying weeks, before being released after high level intervention by the British Government. Once Linda was freed she returned to her home in Dubai and finished the novel, re-writing the kidnap and captivity themes with first hand knowledge!
For further information about Linda Davies and her earlier work, click here.
Keep up to date with Linda Davies by following her official Blog.
Life is strange! Here is an article Linda wrote for her old Oxford college magazine:
Be careful what you write
I am familiar with the oft-quoted proverb of the ancient Greeks: be careful what you wish for the Gods might just grant it, but I had never thought that I would be able to amend it into a stricture of my own: be careful what you write. In my case, the Gods, the Fates, or perhaps a malevolent Djinn, did actually transpose me into the pages of my first novel for children – Sea Djinn.
When I left St Edmund Hall (PPE 1982) I became an investment banker, a career I safely followed for seven years before escaping to write financial thrillers.
This I did happily for twelve years, penning five which were published around the world. These were not without their own attendant dangers. The Chief Executive of one City bank debated long and hard whether or not he should sue me, before deciding rather sensibly I thought that he would prefer not to stand up in court and say that I had based a corrupt, murderous Chief Executive in one of my novels on him. Then there were the unwelcome attentions of a famously intrepid narco pilot who used to fly coca basica from the Huallaga Valley in Peru to the processing factories in Colombia. His stories were fascinating, and they made for research of the highest order, but when he confessed after many hours’ conversation that I understood him better than his wife I thought it was time to leave his jungle stronghold, that I had more than enough background detail for my novel, Into the Fire.
After having had three children, I decided that I had done enough dangerous research. I had long wanted to write for children, and when we moved to Dubai four years ago, I found inspiration in the djinn which feature so strongly in the folklore of the region.
I began to craft Sea Djinn. The plot came to me as I strolled along the beach which is five minutes from our house. A young boy, Finn, would walk that same beach. One evening in the gloaming, he would meet the Sea Djinn of the Light who would reveal to him that his parents had been kidnapped at sea by Hydrus, the Dark Sea Djinn. Together with his cousin, Georgina, and his friend Fred, Finn would steal a boat and set sail for the Dark Kingdom to do battle with Hydrus and free his parents.
With one hundred pages written, my husband and I were kidnapped at sea by the Iranian navy. We were held hostage for two weeks. Fortunately my own children did not have to steal a boat and set sail to any Dark Kingdom to release me and their father. That blessed magic was performed by the UK Government.
I completed Sea Djinn, re-writing the kidnap and captivity themes with considerably greater authority and insight. It was not, however, a form of research I would care to repeat.
So, was our kidnap co-incidence, mere bad luck, or had I written a part of my own destiny, invoked it, perhaps seen it delivered by a malevolent Djinn, of whom, many Emiratis firmly believe, there are many bedevilling this sandy and beguiling region?
A poem written in captivity:
Home
Trapped in a prison of smiling faces,
Wearing a veil to hide my own,
Answering scores of repeated questions,
When will they let me go home?
Pouring with muck sweat under my burka,
My hopes depend on them,
Left alone for a million minutes,
Time stretches without end
Promises, promises roll from their lips,
But nothing is ever delivered.
Inshallah, say the smiling faces
But I think he’s looking away
A birthday cake for a nightmare birthday
A puff and the candles are blown,
Oh please sign the papers in triplicate
And let me go back to my home.
Linda Davies
Q & A with Linda Davies
Tell us about your books for children.
Sea Djinn and Fire Djinn are magical adventure stories set here in Dubai. Sea Djinn is the first in my Djinn Quintet and Fire Djinn, out now, is the second. In Sea Djinn, a young boy called Finn sneaks off to the beach to surf at dusk. He encounters a supernatural being in the waves – the Sea Djinn of the Light –Triton. Triton has a message for Finn and a vision to show him. Soon Finn and his friend Fred and his cousin Georgie become embroiled in the ancient war of the Djinn.
In Fire Djinn, Finn, Fred and Georgie are camping at night in the deserts of Dubai when a voice reveals to them a horrific vision foretelling the end of the world. The Voice calls out to them, as LightFighters to enter the battle and to free him. So once again they have to leave behind their normal Dubai lives. This time they enter the kingdom of Jehannem, the Dark Fire Djinn.
What age group are your children’s books for?
You could read them to a seven or eight year old. Nine years old up will read them themselves. I’ve got many teenage readers, up to around sixteen (see reader comments). A lot of adults really enjoy them too.
You are a best-selling author of adult books with your books translated into over thirty languages and sales in the millions. Why start writing children’s novels?
For my own children, Hugh, Tom and Lara. And because I love it!
The children in your books are quite feisty.
They need to be. Fred wasn’t particularly feisty, but he learned how to channel his inner feistiness! Children face their demons, literally in my books, and learn to fight them. So in a way, my books are songs to children’s rebellious spirit, to the survival instinct, to their empowerment.
What do you try to achieve in your novels?
I want children to get totally immersed and keep turning the pages. I want to create a mysterious, enthralling world into which children, (and adults) can escape.
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