The Last Viking

Ron Dawson was born in Birmingham's Dudley Road Hospital in 1940. At the age of two he was adopted by a canal boatman and his wife. He was brought up on the vast Kingstanding Council estate. He began work as a butcher's boy and for the next nine years had a succession of short-lived jobs, ranging from building site labourer, window cleaner, soft-drinks delivery-man, power-press operator and door-to-door salesman. A serious motorcycle accident led him to train as a teacher of maladjusted children. He went on to gain the degrees of BA., M.Sc., and PhD., mostly by part-time study. He became a Research and Chartered Psychologist, and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. He was principal lecturer for post-graduate awards and Head of Special Needs and Habilitation for ten years in what is now the University of Winchester. He has numerous academic and research based publications, many focused upon behavioural and emotional difficulties. His Teacher Information Pack (Tips), published by Macmillan Education, which embraced the whole range of Special Educational Needs, was described in a psychological Journal review as an 'Opus Magnum'. He was the originator, author and co-developer of the Baby Progress Guides, a pack of materials designed to help parents assess their baby's development. He also had his own regular column, The Dawson File, in Special Children magazine. The Last Viking is his first novel. His next novel "I, Oedipus," is underway and is told from the psychological perspective of a serial rapist and killer who is obsessed by the Oedipus myth.