Jenny Downham (born 1964) is a British novelist and an ex-actress who has published four books.
Her debut novel, Before I Die , is the fictional account of the last few months of a sixteen-year-old girl who has been dying of leukaemia for four years. [1] The book won the 2008 Branford Boase Award. [2] It was short listed for the 2008 Guardian Children's Fiction Prize [3] and the 2008 Lancashire Children's Book of the Year and nominated for the 2008 Carnegie Medal and the 2008 Booktrust Teenage Prize. [4] In 2012 it was adapted into a film called Now Is Good and starred Dakota Fanning. [5]
Downham's second novel, You Against Me , was published in December 2010. [6] The book is a novel about family, loyalty, and the choices which we have to make.
Her third novel, Unbecoming , published in 2015, is a story of three generations of women and the uncovering of family secrets.[ citation needed ]
Her fourth, Furious Thing, published in October 2019, was shortlisted in the children's book category of that year's Costa Book Awards. [7]
Simon Mason is a British author of juvenile and adult fiction, and of non-fiction.
Siobhan Dowd was a British writer and activist. The last book she completed, Bog Child, posthumously won the 2009 Carnegie Medal from the professional librarians, recognising the year's best book for children or young adults published in the UK.
Malcolm Charles Peet was an English writer and illustrator best known for young adult fiction. He has won several honours including the Brandford Boase, the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize, British children's literature awards that recognise "year's best" books. Three of his novels feature football and the fictional South American sports journalist Paul Faustino. The Murdstone Trilogy (2014) and "Mr Godley's Phantom" were his first works aimed at adult readers.
Henrietta Diana Primrose Longstaff Branford was an English author of children's books. Her greatest success was Fire, Bed and Bone (1997), a historical novel set during the English peasants' revolt of 1381. For that she won the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a once-in-a-lifetime book award judged by a panel of British children's writers, and she was a highly commended runner up for the Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject.
Marcus Sedgwick was a British writer and illustrator. He authored several young adult and children's books and picture books, a work of nonfiction and several novels for adults, and illustrated a collection of myths and a book of folk tales for adults. According to School Library Journal his "most acclaimed titles" were those for young adults.
Kevin M. Brooks is an English writer. He is best known for young adult novels. His The Bunker Diary, published by Penguin Books in 2013, won the annual Carnegie Medal as the best new book for children or young adults published in the UK. It was a controversial selection by the British librarians.
Meg Rosoff is an American writer based in London, United Kingdom. She is best known for the novel How I Live Now, which won the Guardian Prize, the Printz Award, the Branford Boase Award and made the Whitbread Awards shortlist. Her second novel, Just in Case, won the annual Carnegie Medal from the British librarians recognising the year's best children's book published in the UK.
Frances Hardinge is a British children's writer. Her debut novel, Fly by Night, won the 2006 Branford Boase Award and was listed as one of the School Library Journal Best Books. She has also been shortlisted for and received a number of other awards for both her novels as well as some of her short stories.
Ally Kennen is a British author of adventure novels for children and teens. Some of her books have been marketed as thrillers and they may be classed as horror fiction.
Finding Violet Park, or Me, the Missing, and the Dead in the U.S., is a young adult novel by Jenny Valentine, published by HarperCollins in 2007. It is about a fatherless teenage boy, Lucas Swain, who finds an urn containing the ashes of the titular Violet Park abandoned in a minicab office and determines to lay her to rest. HarperCollins published the first US edition April 2008, entitled Me, the Missing, and the Dead.
Tabitha Sayo Victoria Anne Suzuma is a British writer. She was born in 1975 and lives in London. She used to work as a primary school teacher and now divides her time between writing and tutoring. She is known for her novel Forbidden which is based on a taboo relationship between brother and sister.
Jenny Valentine is an English children's novelist. For her first novel and best-known work, Finding Violet Park, she won the annual Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a once-in-a-lifetime book award judged by a panel of British children's writers. Valentine lives in Glasbury-on-Wye, Wales with her husband singer/songwriter Alex Valentine, with whom she runs a health food shop in nearby Hay-on-Wye.
Before I Die is a young adult novel written by Jenny Downham, first published by David Fickling Books in 2007. The novel follows Tessa's shortly-ending life from her perspective.
David Fickling Books Ltd (DFB) was founded in 1999 and became an independent publishing house in July 2013 following 12 years (2001-2013) with Scholastic and later Random House. They have published several prize-winning and bestselling books including Lyra's Oxford by Philip Pullman, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne, Bing Bunny by Ted Dewan, Pants by Nick Sharratt and Giles Andreae, Before I Die by Jenny Downham, Trash by Andy Mulligan and A Boy and a Bear in a Boat by Dave Shelton.
Julia Eccleshare MBE is a British journalist and writer on the subject of children's books. She has been Children's Books editor for The Guardian newspaper for more than ten years, at least from 2000. She is also an editorial contributor and advisor for the website Love Reading 4 Kids. She is a recipient of the Eleanor Farjeon Award.
Annabel Pitcher is a British children's writer.
Candy Gourlay is a Filipino journalist and author based in the United Kingdom whose debut novel Tall Story (2010) was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal.
Elle McNicoll is a Scottish and British bestselling children's literature writer. McNicoll has been described as "undoubtedly an outstanding new talent in children's books [who] will inspire readers young and old for generations to come".
Liz Hyder is an English author.
Jenny Pearson is a British teacher and children's author. She is best known for her books The SuperMiraculous Journey of Freddie Yates (2020) and The Incredible Record Smashers (2021).