British writer, highly successful with her books featuring a character named Adrian Mole. She first released “The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole in 1985, the story of a young man aged 13 3/4,” the first in her best-selling “diary” series. In addition, she wrote both the play and the television series that starred the popular character. Other successful books written by Townsend include “The Queen and I,” 1991 and “Ghost Children,” 1998.
Townsend describes her early life as one spent growing up in paradise, with gardens to play in and woods and fields all around. Her first day of school, however, proved a rude awakening. She regarded school as a curtailment of her freedom and says her first day there was her first day in captivity. Not surprisingly, she quit school at age 15. She spent the next two decades working at various jobs while writing in her spare time. When she won the Thames TV Playwright’s Award at age 35, she began writing fulltime.
She is a diabetic, and in 1999, she was diagnosed with diabetic retinopathy. As a result, she suffers from massive vision problems but continues to write, still writing out each book by hand.
Townsend married for the first time before she was 18. Shortly after the birth of their third child, her husband abandoned the family, leaving her to raise the children on her own.
She later remarried and gave birth to a fourth child. She enjoys gardening in her spare time.
Link to Wikipedia biography