Paul Jennings is an English-born Australian children's book writer, television writer and actor. He was born on April 30, 1943 in Heston, Middlesex (now part of Hounslow in London), England, UK. In 1949 his family immigrated to Australia. He lives in Ringwood, Victoria, Australia.
He first attended Bentleigh West Primary School in Bentleigh, a suburb of Melbourne, and then Caulfield Grammar School. He graduated with a Bachelor of Education Studies from Frankston Teachers College at Monash University in 1978 and taught at Frankston State School, Kangaroo Flat State School, the Turana Youth Training Centre and the Royal Children's Hospital State School in Mount Eliza. He then went to the Lincoln Institute of Health Sciences (now part of Monash).
After graduating, he became a speech pathologist and he became a lecturer in special education at the Burwood State College and then, in 1979, Senior Lecturer in Language and Literature at Warrnambool Institute of Advanced Education (both now part of Deakin University).
In 1985, Jennings' first book of short stories, Unreal!, was published, during which he worked as a teacher, lecturer and speech therapist. In 1989, he made the decision to devote himself full-time to writing. He began writing for children when his son, aged 11, was having trouble reading.
His books mainly feature short stories that lead the reader through an unusual series of events that end with a twist.
Jennings' short stories were adapted for the first two seasons of the cult classic children's television series Round the Twist (1989-1992), and then later for the single season of Driven Crazy (1998). He collaborated with Morris Gleitzman on the book series Wicked!, which was adapted into an animated TV series in 2001.
Jennings was awarded the A.M. (Member of the Order of Australia) in the 1995 Queen's New Years Honours List for his services to Children's Literature.
