Peter Francis Tonkin was born in 1950 in Limavady, Co Londonderry. His father was a senior engineering officer in the RAF. During his childhood, Peter grew up in many different countries including N. Ireland, England, Holland, Germany and Bahrain. He was educated at Gloucester House, Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, where he sang in the Cathederal Choir, and at Palmer's School in Essex. At Palmer's, he acted, sang, wrote, edited the school maagazine and rose to be Prefect, Librarian and Deputy Head of House. He won the Jan Palac Memorial prize for poetry and sang with the Essex Youth Choir.

Peter graduated from the Queen's University, Belfast, where he was made a member of the Honours School in English, after studying English, History and Philosophy in his Fresher year. He studied History with Professor John Warren. He studied English with professors Edna Longley and Seamus Heaney. His poetry was broadcast by the BBC. He was a leading undergraduate actor and director, involved in productions as diverse as Pinter's 'A Slight Ache', Albee's 'Zoo Story' Sophocles' 'Oedipus Rex' and Shakespeare's 'Much Ado About Nothing'. He directed 'Everyman' for the 1972 Belfast Festival as well as the First Quarto 'Hamlet' with (as he remembers it) a young Ciaran Hinds as Hamlet. He received special mention from John Arden in the Galway Festival 1973.

He was Literary and Critical Editor of 'Gown', the student newspaper, producing the famous 'Literary Supplement' with poetry by Paul Muldoon and short stories by Bernard MacLaverty as well as articles by Sheridan Morley and Michael Parkinson and an interview with Christopher Lee.

Peter completed his Minor Thesis (1973) and his Master's Thesis (1974) on the Elizabethan Theatre. As a teacher and writer since that time, he has kept at the cutting edge of Shakespeare scholarship. He has taught in a range of schools, rising from temporary-terminal teacher to Head of Department (English and Law), Director of Post-16 Provision and Assistant Headteacher. He has taught English, History and Law to Advanced Level. He is an Examiner at A Level in Law for the OCR board. He has recently been nominated for the Teacher of the Year Award 2010.

Peter's first international best-seller, 'Killer' was bublished in 1978. In the years since then, he has published 30 more novels, 22 in the best-selling 'Mariner' Series of action adventures that have been compared with the books of Alistair MacLean

Alistair MacLean

Alistair Stuart MacLean was a Scottish novelist who wrote popular thrillers or adventure stories, the best known of which are perhaps The Guns of Navarone, Ice Station Zebra and Where Eagles Dare, all three having been made into successful films...

, Desmond Bagley

Desmond Bagley

Desmond Bagley , was a British journalist and novelist principally known for a series of best-selling thrillers...

 and Hammond Innes

Hammond Innes

Ralph Hammond Innes was a British novelist who wrote over 30 novels, as well as children's and travel books....

 and 4 in the 'Master of Defence' series of murder mysteries set in Shakespeare's England.

Peter is married to Charmaine, who owns and runs 'Mangetout the Caterers'. They have two sons - Guy, currently studying English at Trinity College, Oxford, and Mark who will enter the Sixth Form in the next academic year to study Computer Science and Media Arts.

Peter and his family live in Royal Tunbridge Wells. Peter heas recently retired from full-time teaching at The Wildernesse School, Sevenoaks. He continues to write full-time, to teach part-time and to examine Law. He is also in contact with Professor Paul Simpson of his old university, the leading authority on Narratology

Narratology

Narratology denotes both the theory and the study of narrative and narrative structure and the ways that these affect our perception. While in principle the word may refer to any systematic study of narrative, in practice its usage is rather more restricted. It is an anglicisation of French...

, with regard to completing his PhD thesis on the Theory of Narrative.