Standalone Novels
| Title | Published | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|
| Close to the Wind | 2014 | Buy |
| My Name’s Not Friday | 2015 | Buy |
| Nevertheless, She Persisted | 2018 | Buy |
Jon Walter lives in East Sussex and worked as a photojournalist before turning to fiction. He studied English and Theatre at Warwick University. He describes himself as drawn to quieter voices and ordinary people caught in extraordinary circumstances, a description that fits all three of his published novels, each of which places a young protagonist inside a historical upheaval that determines the limits of their freedom.
Close to the Wind (2014), published by David Fickling Books, follows Malik, a 10-year-old boy who flees a warzone with his grandfather and ends up travelling alone after their ship ticket money is stolen. The novel was longlisted for the 2015 Carnegie Medal. My Name’s Not Friday (2015), about a free Black boy sold into slavery in the American South during the Civil War, was also longlisted for the Carnegie Medal.
Nevertheless, She Persisted (2018) takes a different historical moment: Nancy and Clara, two sisters working at Holloway Prison in 1913, where Nancy befriends an imprisoned stage actress known as the Duchess during the suffragette agitation. The title shares a phrase with the American political moment of 2017 but the novel is an entirely separate work, rooted in British history.