A new collaborative work

I have always said that the proudest event of my career was chairing the Carnegie/Kate Greenaway 2013-10-31-13-46-51judging panel.  In 2010 we chose Neil Gaiman as the winner of the Carnegie for his book “The Graveyard Book”; the illustrator being Chris Riddell.  Since then this duo have collaborated on several other works including  “Fortunately the Milk”, a new edition of “Coraline” and “The Sleeper and the Spindle”, which has also been shortlisted for the Carnegie and was the winner of the Kate Greenaway medal for 2016.

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Bloomsbury, 9781408870600

Last week I was lucky enough to attend an evening listening to Chris Riddell, at Bloomsbury Books.  He was discussing his collaboration with Neil Gaiman and specifically about their new offering “Odd and the Frost Giants”.  Chris was in discussion with Rebecca McNally, the publishing director at Bloomsbury and gave us a wonderful insight into how the creative relationship has developed over the years.  Originally Chris was asked to illustrate  “The Graveyard Book” for the English edition as the American version had been illustrated by David McKean and it was so successful that they have worked on a wide range of titles since then.

The new book is a stunning piece of art and a wonderful story based on the Norse myths.  Visually this is a book to treasure with a cut-out front cover and a positive wealth of stunning line drawings.  The underlying themes of the book seem to be about overcoming great adversity and about valuing the beauty that surrounds us.2016-09-11-11-50-59 2016-09-11-11-51-10

Chris Riddell also spoke about the role of librarians, both in libraries and in school libraries and how important they were in promoting books to children and teachers.  This message was very well received by the audience, most of whom were librarians from public and school venues.

2016-09-04-11-51-35 2016-09-04-11-52-02It was a great evening with an opportunity to hear our current Children’s Laureate speak and also to catch up with friends and colleagues.

Children’s Laureate

Last Tuesday, 9th June saw the announcement of who would follow in the footprints of the fantastic Malorie Blackman and become the new Children’s laureate.  I think it was fair to say that most people were ecstatic when we found it was going to be the truly amazing and multi-talented Chris Riddell. His acceptance speech set the tone for the next two years and it promises to be a time when children’s and school librarians will feel supported in the work they are doing.

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Chris has been illustrator for many years as well as a very well respected political cartoonist.  His children’s work has covered from picture books such as the “Emperor of Absurdia”, through “Ottoline”, “Barnaby Grimes”, “Goth Girl” and the “Edge Chronicles”up to “Wyrmeweald”.  He has written and illustrated books by himself but he has also worked in collaboration with others such as Paul Stewart and Neil Gaiman.  Chris was in the vanguard of those illustrators fighting for the acceptance of illustrated books for those past the age of about 7 years and he is firmly behind the campaign to give illustrators equal recognition with their authors.

 

I have to say that my personal favourites are the Goth Girl series, which combine historical backgrounds with the absurdities that we all knew and loved Terry Pratchett for. I can’t wait for the “Goth Girl and the Wuthering Fright” which is due out later this year.  Other titles to look out for are “Doombringer: second book of Cade” (Edge Chronicles) with Paul Stewart, “The book of Demons” with Daniel Whelan and “Witchmyth” with Emma Fischel. Keep your eyes open for all things Laureate related.  Sites to follow are

Twitter  @chrisriddell50    #ChildrensLaureate

Instagram     https://instagram.com/chris_riddell/

Tumblr     http://chrisriddellblog.tumblr.com/

 

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