Sf said biography of martin

British children's writer (born 1967)

S. F. Said (born 1967) is a British children's penman.

His first novel was Varjak Paw (2003), illustrated by Dave McKean and published by Painter Fickling Books in January 2003; four months later in goodness U.S.,^[1]Varjak Paw won the 2003 Nestlé Smarties Book Prize.^[2] Greatness sequel, The Outlaw Varjak Paw (2005), won the 2007 Murky Peter Book of the Class.

Phoenix (2013) is a someone novel written for older descendants. It was shortlisted for say publicly Guardian Children's Fiction Prize post was selected to represent say publicly U.K. on the IBBY Bring shame on List for 2016.^[3]Tyger, his quarter book, won Children's Book sustenance the Year at the 2023 British Book Awards^[4] and Grandeur Week Junior Book Awards,^[5] tell off was Waterstones Children's Book expend the Month for September 2023.^[6]

Biography

S.

F. Said is a Island Muslim author of Middle Asian background, who was born sight Beirut^[7] and spent his leading years in Jordan. He describes his origins as "Iraqi, Afroasiatic, Kurdish, and Circassian."^[8] He grew up in London, moving wide with his mother at primacy age of two.

After graduating from the University of City, he worked as a press attaché and speech writer choose the Crown Prince of Jordan's office in London for cardinal years.^[9] He began a Ph.D. in 1997 looking at description lives of young Muslims double up Britain, but left academia come to get focus on film journalism portend The Daily Telegraph – site he brought attention to still so-called world cinema, including coeval Islamic cinema – and antipathy writing for children.

Said has also written a number weekend away articles and reviews for The Guardian about children's books.^[10] Go over the top with March to September 2023, Voiced articulate was the Writer in Domicile at UK children's reading generosity Booktrust.^[11]

Writing career

S. F.

Said has published four novels for race thus far. Varjak Paw tells the story of a Mesopotamian Blue cat called Varjak who leaves his sheltered upbringing persist at explore the city and finish the "Seven Skills of nobleness Way", taught to him expose dreams by his ancestor Jalal. In his dreams, Varjak finds himself transported from his ballsy urban surroundings to the prudent, rivers and mountains of Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq).

With the Facility, he is able to battle the Gentleman. Varjak was display as a play by Box Theatre,^[12] and was performed translation an opera by The Composition Group in 2008.^[13] Said wrote 17 drafts of the book.^[9]

In the sequel, The Outlaw Varjak Paw (2005), the domineering "white cat with one eye", Offensive Bones, invades the territories possession other cats and ruling them with torture and terror, abstruse Varjak leads the other cats – and some dogs – in the fight against draw.

In 2020, Blue Peter voluntarily the audience to vote supportive of their all-time favourite Blue Pecker Book Award-winner, and The Bandit Varjak Paw was included take away the top ten.^[14]

Phoenix is band a Varjak-world novel. The Www Speculative Fiction Database calls nonoperational young-adult science fiction rather fondle (animal) fantasy.^[1] It made class shortlist of four books detail the 2014 Guardian Children's Narrative Prize, whose judges recommended leisurely walk for ages 10 and encumber, and whose coverage by The Guardian called it a "space epic".^[15][16]

Said has contributed an paper to The Gifts of Reading (2020), an anthology inspired impervious to Robert Macfarlane's essay of authority same name.^[17] He also discretional a story to The Publication of Hopes (2020), edited dampen Katherine Rundell, an anthology send off for young readers that raised flat broke for NHS charities during representation COVID-19 pandemic in the U.K.^[18]

Tyger, is Said's latest novel.

The Times writes that the "novel shares that fight of satisfactory against evil, but this disgust the lead cat is copperplate magical “tyger”, an immortal actuality who comes to an ballot 21st-century London where the annulment of slavery was never effected and empire is still ransack great guns".^[19]Tyger takes its honour from William Blake's poem The Tyger, and the British Principles Fiction Association Review called excellence book "a pure delight, reminding us of the creative land and breath-taking power of passage and images on the printed page."^[20] It was an Editor's Choice for The Bookseller publication prior to publication in Grave 2022.^[21]

Additionally, Said has judged natty number of major U.K.

publication prizes, including the Costa Volume Awards, the Guardian Children Falsehood Prize, the inaugural Amnesty/CILIP Honour,^[22] and the BookTrust Lifetime Acquisition Award.^[23]

Books

• Varjak Paw, illustrated by Dave McKean (David Fickling Books, 2003)^[1]
• The Outlaw Varjak Paw, illus.

  Dave McKean (David Fickling, 2005)

• Phoenix, illus. Dave McKean (David Fickling, 2013), 489 pp., OCLC 859389140
• Tyger, illus. Dave McKean (David Fickling, 2022), 304 pp.

Awards

References

External links