| Jim Crace | |
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Jim Crace at the 2009 Texas Book Festival. |
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| Born | 1 March 1946 St Albans, Hertfordshire, England |
| Occupation | Writer |
| Nationality | English |
| Period | 1974-present |
| Genres | Realistic fiction, historical fiction |
| Notable work(s) | Continent, Being Dead, Quarantine |
James "Jim" Crace (born 1 March 1946) is a contemporary English writer. The winner of numerous awards, Crace also has a large popular following. He currently lives in the Moseley area of Birmingham with his wife. They have two children, Thomas Charles Crace (born 1981) and the actress Lauren Rose Crace, who played Danielle Jones in EastEnders.
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Crace was born in St Albans, Hertfordshire, and grew up with his siblings, Richard, Cyril, and Graham in Forty Hill, an area at the far northern point of Greater London, close to Enfield, where Crace attended Enfield Grammar School. He studied for a degree at the Birmingham College of Commerce (now part of Birmingham City University), where he was enrolled as an external student of the University of London.[1] After securing a BA (Hons) in English Literature in 1968, he travelled overseas with the UK organization Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO), working in Sudan. Two years later he returned to the UK, and worked with the BBC, writing educational programmes. From 1976 to 1987 he worked as a freelance journalist for The Daily Telegraph and other newspapers.
In 1974 he published his first work of prose fiction, Annie, California Plates in The New Review, and in the next 10 years would write a number of short stories and radio plays, including:
In 1986 Crace published Continent. Continent won the Whitbread First Novel of the Year Award, the David Higham Prize for Fiction, and the Guardian Fiction prize. This work was followed by The Gift of Stones, Arcadia, Signals of Distress, Quarantine, Being Dead and Six. His most recent novel, The Pesthouse, was published in the UK in March 2007.
Despite living in Britain, Crace is more successful in the United States, as evidenced by the award of the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1999.
Crace is a keen amateur birdwatcher. His other major interest is live music at small venues.
International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
National Book Critics Circle Fiction Award (USA)
Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize
American Academy of Arts and Letters
GAP International Prize for Literature (USA)
Premio Antico Fattore
David Higham Prize for Fiction