Gabrielle Kent is a British novelist who has made a name for herself in both children's literature and game design. Growing up in the 1980s, she had a fondness for biking, drawing monsters, reading comics, and playing games on her friend's Atari. These early experiences would later provide inspiration for her writing and game design.\n \nKent's career in the video game industry began with her first job working on games for PC, Playstation, and XBox. She spent sixteen years as a university lecturer, teaching students how to make video games, and ran a major Animation and Computer Games festival. Through her work in game design, she has become adept at creating vast and expansive worlds. This skill has carried over into her writing, where she sets up wide and engaging landscapes for her characters to inhabit.
In 2006, Kent visited Castle Coch in Wales and was inspired to write a story about a boy who inherits a castle. This idea became the Alfie Bloom series, which includes three books. Her love of childhood in the eighties and her passion for video games also came together when she was asked to write a series of novels based on the characters and world from the game, Knights and Bikes.
In addition to the Alfie Bloom and Knights and Bikes series, Kent has also written Tiffany Aching's Guide to Being a Witch, an illustrated Discworld guide co-authored with Rhianna Pratchett. Her latest series, Rani Reports, was co-created with her husband, Satish Shewhorak, and features a girl who wants to be an investigative journalist and her adventures with her rambunctious Mauritian nani. Kent currently resides in the North East of England with her husband, toddler, and Bengal cat, Kali – Destroyer of Sofas.