Gareth Jones
Children's Author
(C) British Library
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Associate Agent
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Biography
Gareth P Jones was first published in 2007 with The Dragon Detective Agency (republished in 2020 as Dragon Detective). Since then he had over 50 books for children published. The Considine Curse won The Blue Peter Book Award 2012. The Thornthwaite Inheritance (2009) is now considered a cult classic of children’s fiction. He is also responsible for series fiction Ninja Meerkats, Pet Defenders, Steampunk Pirates and his interactive series, Solve Your Own Mystery. His other standalone novels include Constable & Toop, The Thornthwaite Betrayal & Death or Ice Cream? His picture books include Rabunzel, CinderGorilla, Snowy White, The Lion on the Bus, Are You The Pirate Captain?, There’s Nothing Funny about Bums and Chicken Vs. Egg.
As well as a successful author, Gareth is a performer, composer & multi-instrumentalist. He performs in schools, libraries, theatres throughout the year. His latest performance project, The Ministry of Mini-Musicals involves turning his own picture books into musical extravaganzas. In 2026 he took CinderGorilla: The Musical to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Previously he has taken shows to Hay, Edinburgh International Book Festival, Cheltenham and Bath. He also regularly appears at music festivals, including Greenman, Latitude, Wilderness, Camp Bestival, Wychwood and Glastonbury.
Nominations and Awards:
The Dragon Detective Agency: The Case Of The Missing Cats was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize.
The Thornthwaite Inheritance was shortlisted for eleven local book awards and won seven of them.
The Considine Curse was voted Blue Peter Book of the Year 2012.
Chicken vs Egg (2026)
Have you ever wondered which came first – the chicken or the egg? Get ready for the ultimate showdown in this race to the finish line and, finally, an answer to this age-old philosophical question!
With Chicken’s obvious advantage, Egg’s surprising capabilities, and a pesky Fox with his own agenda, it’s anyone’s guess who will cross the line first. Will Chicken be able to outfox the competition? But wait, there’s a twist! Egg is hatching and a new runner is about to enter the race!
Publications
Selected Publications
One puzzling mystery. Several slippery suspects. Endless possibilities!
Welcome to Haventry, a town where the ordinary and extraordinary collide! With ghosts, werewolves and zombies living side by side, trouble is always brewing. And when a fiendish crime is committed,?YOU?are the detective in charge of the case.
All aboard the Transylvanian Express! YOU and your yeti boss Klaus are headed to Castle Ursprung, home of the infamous vampire Count Fledermaus. But before you get there, you have a mystery to solve: Night Mayor Franklefink has vanished from the train.
Someone onboard must have played a role in his disappearance but who has the strongest motive? Could it be Franklefink’s archnemesis Bramwell Stoker? Or is Sandra Rigmarole, elf District Governor and colleague of the Night Mayor, a more likely suspect? Or perhaps Franklefink’s monster wife has suddenly turned against him? YOU decide!
With hundreds of paths to choose from and no dead ends, you’ll solve the mystery every time!
Rabunzel has a teeny tufty tail, a twitchy nose and two wide brown eyes. She also has VERY long ears – so long that her mother worries they will make her easy bait for the hungry creatures of the forest.
The answer? Rabunzel must be kept safe … in towering hutch, high in the sky. Here Rabunzel waits grumpily for her mother’s daily visit with carrots and fresh lettuce, letting down her ears so she can climb up the tower.
But one day, it isn’t her mother who climbs up Rabunzel’s very long ears..
Larkin Mills: The Birthplace of Death!
Larkin Mills is no ordinary town. It’s a place of contradictions and enigma, of secrets and mysteries. A place with an exquisite ice cream parlour, and an awful lot of death.
An extraordinary mystery in Larkin Mills is beginning to take shape. First we meet the apparently healthy Albert Dance, although he’s always been called a sickly child, and he’s been booked into Larkin Mills’ Hospital for Specially Ill Children. Then there’s his neighbour Ivor, who observes strange goings-on, and begins his own investigations into why his uncle disappeared all those years ago. Next we meet Young Olive, who is given a battered accordion by her father, and unwittingly strikes a dreadful deal with an instrument repair man.
Make sure you keep an eye on Mr Morricone, the town ice-cream seller, who has queues snaking around the block for his legendary ice cream flavours Summer Fruits Suicide and The Christmas Massacre. And Mr Milkwell, the undertaker, who has some very dodgy secrets locked up in his hearse. Because if you can piece together what all these strange folks have to do with one another . . . well, you’ll have begun to unlock the dark secrets that keep the little world of Larkin Mills spinning . . .
Ovid and Lorelli Thornthwaite have been trying to kill each other for so long that neither twin can remember which act of attempted murder came first. But whoever struck first, trying to take each other’s lives is simply what they do. Until one day a lawyer arrives at their house to take stock of its contents, and his accompanying son attracts their attention. Soon a new battle evolves – one in which the twins have to work together to solve the mystery of their parents’ deaths. Can Lorelli and Ovid overcome their old animosities, and will they ever get to finish that game of chess?