Jan Needle
Jan Needle (*1943) is a British author, who, as he says on his website, does "... a bit of everything ...". Needle's work includes fiction for children (e.g. My Mate Shofiq), fiction for adults (partially published under the pseudonym 'Frank Kippax' like e.g. Other People’s Blood) and a series of naval fiction revolving around his hero William Bentley (e.g. A Fine Boy for Killing).
In his mid-twenties N. left journalism to start a career as a writer, beginning with playwriting and later short stories and novels.
N. writes from an openly admitted political left-wing angle, his main themes being brutality, exploitation, racism and poverty. Thus he was able to add to the genre of naval (adventure) fiction a new perspective in his William Bentley books by depicting 18th century naval life as extremely brutal, bleak and marked by deprivation for the common sailor. A fact most "officer centred" naval fiction chooses not to explore.