David Gemmell

UK fantasy writer and an occasional historical fictionalist, David Gemmell, was born on August 1, 1948, in West London. At the age of sixteen, Gemmell was expelled from his school for organising a gambling syndicate. He never really returned to studying and decided to work as a labourer. His six-foot-four-inch and 230 pound frame earned him quick bucks working as a bouncer in a night club in Soho. Later, he worked as a freelance writer for publications like ‘The Daily Express’ and ‘The Daily Mail’. During this time, he also completed writing his very first novel called ‘Legend’. He wrote ‘The King beyond the Gate’ in 1985.

David Gemmell’s third novel titled ‘Waylander’ was released in 1984, which finally gave him enough momentum to start writing novels fulltime and quit journalism. Since he used the names of his previous office colleagues in the third novel, he garnered criticism from the managing director and others in his office. As a fulltime writer, Gemmell published 29 books under his own name and all of these have been in print ever since. Only one novel is out of print: ‘White Knight, Black Swan’ which he published under the name, Ross Harding. The recently released book by David Gemmell is ‘Troy: Shield of Thunder’.