Radcliffe, Mark 1958-

PERSONAL:

Born June 29, 1958, in Bolton, England; son of Philip and Doreen Radcliffe; married; children: three daughters. Education: University of Manchester, B.A.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Whitley, Cheshire, England. E-mail—mark.radcliffe@bbc.co.uk.

CAREER:

Radio producer and presenter. Piccadilly Radio, Manchester, England, 1979-83; Radio 1, London, England, producer, 1983-85; Piccadilly Radio, head of music, 1985-86; BBC Manchester, Manchester, England, producer, then senior producer, 1986—; BBC Radio 1, presenter, 1991-2004; Radio 2, presenter. M And TV Productions, director.

WRITINGS:

The Mark Radcliffe Show (nonfiction), BBC Audiobooks (London, England), 1997.

Showbusiness: The Diary of a Rock 'n' Roll Nobody (nonfiction), Sceptre (London, England), 1998.

Northern Sky (novel), Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 2005.

SIDELIGHTS:

Mark Radcliffe is an English radio presenter and producer. After completing his studies at the University of Manchester, Radcliffe got his start in radio broadcasting with Piccadilly Radio in Manchester but left after a few years to look for work in London. While there he found work as a producer with Radio 1, only to return to Piccadilly Radio in 1985 to take the position of head of music at the station. Radcliffe began working with BBC Radio a year later and eventually became a senior producer there. With the BBC, he became an on-air presenter for various shows on various channels, sometimes with a cohost, other times solo, one year doing a morning show, the next an evening show.

In 2005 Radcliffe ventured into writing novels, publishing Northern Sky. Overly sensitive Ed Beckinsale reunites with his old friends at the Northern Sky Folk Club after losing his job at the university. The group finds their differences amplified after the time spent apart but ultimately come together with the prospect of creating a band among them. Harry Guerin, reviewing the book in RTE, stated: "As you'd expect from someone who talks for a living, Radcliffe is good at writing dialogue." A contributor to Kirkus Reviews called the book "a familiar story about love and pop music that ultimately slips out of key," noting in particular that "the conclusion feels overly engineered and infused with false drama." Guerin added that Ed "becomes too predictable too quickly," but praised the fact that Radcliffe's "style is simple and fluid, and he's never eager to show off his music knowledge."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Kirkus Reviews, September 1, 2006, review of Northern Sky, p. 870.

ONLINE

BBC Radio 2 Web site,http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/ (March 5, 2007), author profile.

Planet Bods Network,http://www.planetbods.org/ (March 5, 2007), author profile.

RTE,http://www.rte.ie/ (November 21, 2005), Harry Guerin, review of Northern Sky.