The censorship of my award-winning young adult novel,Into The River, made me a minor literary celebrity. All I wanted was to get working-class boys to read • fresh Zealand protests planned in solidarity with banned bookI grew up in fresh Zealand in the 1960s before the genre of young adult fiction had been invented. The books offered to me were watered-down versions of the classics (Sir Walter Scott, and Wilkie Collins etc),which I would grind through in an attempt to discover something challenging. When I finally came across Keith Waterhouse and Alan Sillitoe it was a revelation. Even though their worlds were far from mine they carried the sharp stink of authenticity. They began me on a path of reading – and much later, writing – that led me to where I find myself today; a minor literary celebrity, and for all the incorrect reasons.
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Source: theguardian.com