Anne Fine chat

Little M sat down for a chat...with Anne Fine

Anne Fine was the second Children’s Laureate from 2001-2003. Little M caught up with her at this year's announcement for the eighth laureate, Malorie Blackman.

Little M: Can you remember what your favourite book or series was when you were a child?

Anne Fine: When I was seven, it was definitely Enid Blyton’s Faraway Tree books. I adored them. When I was about 9, it was Jennings books by Anthony Buckeridge. They were school stories; I loved them. When I was about eleven it was William books by Richmal Crompton. I adored those and I did remember who my favourites were – but it did change as I got older.

Little M: Did you like reading as a child?

Anne Fine: I read all the time. Because my mum had triplets when I was three and was just overwhelmed with work, I went to infant school really early. I just learned to read along with everybody else. They were five and learning to read with phonics and I was three and went along with them. So I’ve always read. And also, when you come from a big family, reading’s a lovely escape so I read all the time.

Little M: What’s your opinion on closures of libraries?

Anne Fine: It’s disgraceful. I think it’s the act of an absolutely barbaric government to sit by and watch, pretending it’s nothing to do with them, and allow local authorities to do it. I think that the government is disgraced by its attitude to the closure of closures. It’s utterly, utterly shameful.

Little M: What is your favourite novel you have written?

Anne Fine: I have two favourites. For younger children, I’m tremendously fond of How To Write Really Badly. I just think it’s funny and I like it. And The Angel of Nitshill Road. Those two together are my favourites for younger children. And for older children, one of my favourites is The Book of the Banshee.

(PS. Anne mentioned another title too but it got stolen by the sound of the wind and Little M couldn’t hear it!).

Little M: What did you do as a laureate?

Anne Fine: I started the My Home Library website, which is still running and has over 200 free downloadable bookplates for children to build their own home libraries with secondhand books where you can cover up the name of the last person who owned it and it’s new to you. I did work for blind children and raised £30 000 to start off an interleaved Braille picture book scheme that Clear Vision is still doing. They’ve got a lending library of interleaved Braille picture books for families with blind parents who want to read to their children or blind children who want to read to their parents. They’ve got thousands in the library now so I’m very proud of that. I did three poetry collections, I did 5o talks. I never stopped. I’ve never worked so hard in my life. I spent two years and I didn’t write a thing! When I finished, it was just bliss to be writing again.

*****

Malorie Blackman chat

Little M sat down for a chat..with Malorie Blackman

Little M was Booktrust’s Young Reporter for the day at the Waterstones Children’s Laureate 2013-2015  Announcement. She managed to squeeze in a few minutes with Malorie Blackman, the new Children’s Laureate.

Little M interviewing Malorie Blackman

On becoming a writer

Malorie Blackman started writing short stories and poems for herself since she was about seven. She said that “when I knew that I wanted to be a writer, I didn’t have a clue about how to go about it so I started doing a writing class.” She wanted to know how to do it professionally.

Little M: Can you remember what your favourite book or series was when you were a child?

Malorie: “There was a series called The Chalet School. It was about girls in a boarding school in Switzerland and their adventures. I read a number of those for a while but then I stopped reading them because I thought... they were okay but I wanted to read something that I felt reflected my life a bit more. From about 10 or 11, I wanted to read more books that reflected life as I knew it so I started reading adult books – because there weren’t books for teenagers really. So when I was 11 or 12 I started reading the Agatha Christie books and I loved Poirot and Miss Marple. I also read a number of books about myths and legends from around the world.”

Little M: What is your opinion on library closures?

Malorie: “I think it is a really short sighted thing to do. I understand that local authorities are under pressure so they have to save money somewhere. But in these times I think we need libraries more not less. I think a number of people go there to get advice and to find a safe environment to do homework. My mum, who is 75, has recently started taking computer lessons at her local library. I think when countries like Russia and South Korea are actually building new libraries because they recognise the value of them, it seems a shame that we don’t recognise the same value in this country and we’re shutting them down. Very shortsighted.”

Little M: What is your favourite novel you have written so far?

Malorie: “I think of all the ones I have written so far, probably Noughts & Crosses. Noughts & Crosses was the hardest book to write, but it was the most satisfying book to write. It was the most painful to write because some of the things that happened to Callum in the book happened to me. Like when I first travelled first class on a train, the ticket inspector insisted that I must have stolen the ticket and stuff like that. And some of the stuff that happened at school. That happened to me.”

Below is Little M’s reporting of events behind the scene at the announcement. This report originally appeared on the Children’s Laureate website and is reproduced here with Booktrust’s permission. But the pics are newly posted!

Behind the scenes at the Children’s Laureate Announcement 2013-15 - by Little M

I give a big thank you to Booktrust for inviting me to be their young reporter for the Children’s Laureate Announcement on the 4^th June 2013. It was a massive honour to be there. Thank you! Malorie Blackman was selected as the Children's Laureate for 2013-15. She will be the Laureate for 2 years and then in 2015 another author will be selected.



Author Laure Dockrill

We travelled far to get to London but it was well worth the long journey. When we entered Kings Place which is next to The Guardian, we were greeted by Caroline and Leanne from Booktrust and were shown into the lovely Battlebridge room which overlooked the Canal. There we bumped into a few authors. We had a chat with Laura Dockrill who was wearing an amazingly colourful dress, Patrick Ness, and Philip Ardagh.

Fuuny, funny authors Liz Pichon and Philip Ardagh

Everyone was in a jolly, excited mood waiting to find out who the new Laureate would be. Every person who went there had their own suspicion and I thought it might be Malorie because she has written some amazing novels like Noughts & Crosses and Pig Heart Boy which many people love. Patrick Ness also hoped it would be Malorie.

A monster walked in.......Patrick Ness

We all then went into Hall 2 and Krishnan Guru-Murthy from Channel 4 News kicked off the announcement. He was very jokey and then after a bit of talking passed us onto Viv Bird who is the Chief Executive of Booktrust. She said thank you to all the sponsors and everyone who made this wonderful role happen. She also mentioned that ALCS is now one of their new sponsors.  Abigail Campbell, who is the Chair of the Children's Laureate Steering Group, spoke next. She spoke of how the Laureate award came to be. It started up from a conversation between Ted Hughes and Michael Morpurgo and now we have this fabulous laureateship. She also said that on Twitter there was something going around saying Julia Donaldson should be Dr Who!

We then listened to Julia Donaldson who was the previous Laureate. She listed what she had achieved whilst being the Laureate and showed us photos of her library journey through  the country. One of the pictures was of her van/car before and after her trip. Before, the car was nice and looking new and then after it had dents. She was quite funny!

Also, deaf pupils from Thomas Tallis School and Life and Deaf put on a play which Julia had helped them with. It made every one laugh.

And finally the wonderful, magnificent Malorie Blackman was announced as the 8^th Children’s Laureate. I never knew that Malorie was so funny. Right from the first words, she was very funny.   We then did a bit more mingling and I got to speak Anne Fine and Julia Donaldson.

Malorie Blackman and Julia Donaldson

Then I got to ask Malorie Blackman a few questions. She said that the closure of libraries “is a really short sighted thing to do” and that “Noughts & Crosses was the hardest book to write, but it was the most satisfying book to write”.

I think Malorie will be a brilliant Laureate, she will inspire hundreds to thousands of children and teens to either read or write. I like the idea of her making schools read for at least 10 minutes a day.  In our school we read the play of Noughts & Crosses and pretty much everyone enjoys it. My favourite book by Malorie is her new book, Noble Conflict. It has a brilliant plot and I think many people will love it!    

This was a wonderful day that I am never going to forget. It was definitely worth the trip down to London and I hope that everyone who attended enjoyed it. My favourite part was being able to interview Malorie Blackman and meeting everyone.

Children's Laureate Announcement 2013-2015

First of all, we’d like to thank Booktrust for inviting us to the Waterstones Children’s Laureate 2013 – 2015 Announcement on 4 June 2013, and particularly for asking Little M to be their young reporter for the day. The whole event was superdooperfabulastic! Look out for Little M’s blogpost about the event which will be posted by Booktrust.

For those of you who don’t know, Malorie Blackman was announced as the 8^th Children’s Laureate. Krishnan Guru-Marthy (Channel 4 news journalist) introduced the new laureate as someone whose time had come! These are my (M’s) brief thoughts on the day and Malorie Blackman in her new role.

In her acceptance speech, Malorie Blackman set an enthusiastic, energetic, vibrant and determined tone for her spell as the 8^th Children’s Laureate. Based on her novels, we thought she had a good chance of being the new Laureate although we didn’t know if a writer whose books were predominantly for teens would ‘qualify’. They do!

Diversity is sure to be a key element of her laureateship not only in terms of demographics and life experiences but also in terms of genres and literary/storytelling forms and she made particular references to comics and short stories. Her aim is to make reading irresistible and to have “more children reading more.”

Just like her books, Blackman delivered a vocal punch and warned that she will be “championing public libraries” as it was libraries that both inspired her and “taught me to aspire..(..)..they made my own vision sharper and clearer, ” she said.

And then we went all Julia Donaldson style with time and had a bit of a squash and a squeeze: somehow between the Guardian kids site webcast recording, teen reader and Sky News interviews, I managed to scrape in a little heart-to-heart chat with Blackman about the theme of mothers in her novel, Knife Edge (second in the Noughts and Crosses sequence).

Having read some of her novels, having listened to her speeches, having seen her interactions with people, and having spent a privileged half an hour in her company, I think Malorie Blackman is going to be a hardworking, inspirational and outspoken Laureate. I think this may be her striding edge.

It was also great to meet the team that supports Blackmans’ novels: her publishers at Random House Children's Publishers – publicist Harriet Venn, editor Natalie Doherty, publisher Annie Eaton and MD Philippa Dickinson as well as Malorie's literary agent, Hilary Delamere (who is also a trustee for the Siobhan Dowd Trust).

 

Harriet Venn, Natalie Doherty and Annie Eaton from Randhom House Children's Publishers
 

Harriet spoke about her love for the Noughts & Crosses series (as well as Harry Potter) and what the Laureateship might do for an author as an entity as distinct from their books. Natalie spoke about enjoying working with Malorie on the short story Callum as well as Noble Conflict, and about how Malorie is an author who is happy to work with an editor’s suggested changes as well as stick with some ideas of her own. A beaming (and tall!) Philippa arranged an interview for Little M, with author Anne Fine. I met Hilary prior to the announcement (not knowing who she was) and she tried to put us onto other scents when Little M and I put Malorie’s frame into the picture as a possible Laureate. Dark horse!

Coming up on the blog, you can look forward to Little M’s interviews with Malorie Blackman, previous Children’s Laureate Anne Fine plus some chats with a host of other authors and guests who were present. This may get bookishly monstrous.....

 

...with Patrick Ness!


And Annie Eaton insisted on taking a photo of Little M and I together (thanks, Annie!)