BOOKS: CHILDREN'S
Agents' initials follow each client's entry
Sita has an extremely distinguished career in theatre, both in theatre education and as a dramaturge. She started at The Royal Court Theatre, where her work with ethnic groups led to coverage in The Guardian and Times Educational Supplement. Sita went on to become Education Director for Talawa Theatre Company, (Britain’s first Black Theatre Company) and Head of Script Development for the Black and Asian Women Writers’ Project. Her writing on Theatre Education and Community “On The Subject of Drama” was published by Routledge. As a dramaturge and script developer, companies include The Arts Council, Kali Theatre Company and The National Theatre Studio. Sita has also been commissioned by the RSC and her work led to appearances on BBC Radio 4’s “Women’s Hour.” and “The Big Read.” Her latest commission “Lyrical MC” received a London tour including and The Unicorn and the Soho Theatre. She lives in North London with her husband and three children.
Sita’s debut novel ARTICHOKE HEARTS is a beautiful and unusual book which charts the development of Mira through puberty as her beloved grandmother, the irrepressible Nana Josie, is dying of cancer. Mira comes from a bohemian family and it’s not always easy to be heard. As her grandmother’s health declines, she learns to find her voice and fill her own space. She begins to wonder why her mysterious friend Jide (for whom she is developing feelings) is hiding his. It is an incredibly uplifting story which looks love, life, art and death in the face.
UK Publisher: Macmillan, January 2011
ISLE OF MIRRORS
Her second novel ISLE OF MIRRORS is an intense, beautiful and mystical novel which follows a group of children and their teacher on a school trip to an island somewhere between Ireland and Wales. It is a journey which will change them all.
UK Publisher: Macmillan, June 2011
SGB
MBA is proud to represent Christopher William Hill for his series of books set in the fictional city of Schwartzgarten. Schwartzgarten is a strange city with an even stranger collection of inhabitants. It might remind you of Prague in the 1920s and the darkly comic writing has shades of Hilaire Belloc and Lemony Snicket.
Christopher is an extremely well-renowned writer, recipient of the Peter Tinniswood Award and a BBC Radio & Music Award. He also adapted John Masefield’s classic The Midnight Folk for radio. His experience in writing for children includes having twice written for the National Theatre’s prestigious Connections project. His first play, MULTIPLEX (2003) was performed on the Olivier stage, and has received over forty productions by teenage casts in the UK and internationally. HEARTBREAK BEAUTIFUL (2009) was performed at the National Theatre, and has already had sixteen productions in the UK and was performed in Sao Paulo, Brazil last Autumn. He has recently written ITTULLKYLLYOOIFFYOODOO, a play for primary school children, which has been performed at Polka Theatre, Plymouth Theatre Royal, Dundee Rep and York Theatre Royal.
SGB
Brian Keaney is a former teacher who now writes full time. His other books include THE HAUNTING OF NATHANIEL WOLFE, which was shortlisted for the South Lanarkshire Children's Book Award. His Young Adult fantasy trilogy, THE PROMISES OF DR SIGMUNDUS, has received rave reviews.
THE GALLOWGLASS was selected as part of the Everyone's Reading Campaign, a government gifting scheme which aims to help raise reading standards among 11-18 year olds.
To find out more about Brian visit his website.
12-year-old Otto lives above a second hand bookshop with his mother and one day he returns from school to find the shop open but his mother missing. At first, Otto tries to carry on as usual, hoping his mother will come back by herself. But there are too many strange things about his mother’s disappearance. Like the way the air in bookshop seemed to crackle with electricity when Otto walked through the door. Or the fact that he could swear that he saw his mother in the mirror soundlessly calling for help.
Uncertain whom to turn to, Otto discovers a card on the shop notice board advertising a Magical Detective Agency and decides to give them a ring. The Magical Detective Agency is the brainchild of Maximilian Hawksmoor. Utterly brilliant but hopelessly absent-minded, Max is convinced that Otto’s mother has been abducted by Elemental Beings from another world. The only way to get her back is through a magical portal in the abandoned garden of a nearby stately home.
But the spell to take them through the portal accidentally includes Juliet Pennington, a classmate of Otto’s, and her cat, Cornelius. Juliet is indignant to find herself transported right out of our universe. But her indignation is nothing compared to that of Cornelius for in this other world cats can talk, and Cornelius has plenty to say for himself.
Join Otto, Max, Juliet and Cornelius as they set out on an incredible adventure involving magic carpets, houses with personality problems and a little bit of what every magical detective needs – hunchability.
UK publisher: Orchard, July 2010
NATHANIEL WOLFE AND THE BODYSNATCHERS
The dead cannot rest in peace. Bodysnatchers are plundering the graveyard and stirring up more than they bargained for. It's a job for a ghost hunter! But first Nathaniel Wolfe must take a terrifying journey to the Other Side and put right a terrible wrong...
NATHANIEL WOLFE AND THE BODYSNATCHERS is the second novel featuring the young detective of the supernatural. The first THE HAUNTING OF NATHANIEL WOLFE was published in 2008.
UK publisher: Orchard, June 2009
LL
THE WEATHERLORD
This is the third in a fantasy trilogy for children by a debut novelist. It’s a wonderful, heartfelt story about a land betrayed by its refusal to acknowledge its own history.
Leo has been caught and condemned to death for revealing this history. However, he’s daringly rescued, and another boy is executed in his place for appearance’s sake.
While the revolutionaries prepare to overturn the corrupt lords of Assalay, a boy arrives from a distant part of the country. There’s something wrong with him, and he’s unable to articulate what’s wrong, but the very large machine that he’s in charge of is breaking down.
Gaia and Tal, and Rachel and Leo, follow the boy on a perilous mission. Much of it is underground – out of the sight of the moons, which they’ve never done before. What they find is a huge weather-making machine gone mad. They realise why the land is so sick: it’s not just the society, it’s the ecology as well. It’s up to them to heal it all.
THE WEATHERLORD is more than an epic fantasy – it’s a journey of self discovery, of political corruption and a dark ecological warning
THE SINGING WAR
Rachel and Leo are the privileged children of The Fellowship. Their indulgent and colourful lives are a sharp contrast to their countrymen, born under straightened circumstances, living in a society run to strict order on a land bowed under by deprivation.
But Rachel and Leo are struggling too. Rachel is stifled by her the endless round of tea parties in a pre feminist society and Leo has been apprenticed to his worst nightmare. They both make discoveries that rock the very foundations of their existence and not only theirs, but those of everyone around them. Their land and their history have been built on a lie. One person lies at the heart of the truth; the catalyst to bring equality and prosperity to a land ravaged by famine and corruption. But that person is a friendless young girl, poor and imprisoned.
To a casual observer the world created by the Fellowship is beautiful and opulent, but Tracey Mathias scratches its surface and reveals the powerful human drama taking centre stage.
Rights sold: Germany, France
THE LOST IVORY
Gaia and her brother Tal are on the mountainside looking after the family goats when there's an unseasonal attack by dragons. Then their feudal lord makes an unexpected visit to bleed them dry of what few resources they have. When he doesn't find enough to cover his gambling debts, he takes most of the village as slaves: their best friend, and even their mother.
In desperation, Gaia and Tal leave the mountainside – the first of the villagers to do so in living memory. What they find is a land in distress. When they arrive in the capital city, and hope to rescue their mother, Gaia gets arrested for stealing food and Tal denies her to save his own life.
After miserable and dangerous adventures separately, they find each other again – and discover the real history of their land.
Rights sold: Germany: Oetinger; France: Mango
MD and SGB
Suzi is a trained and experienced teaching assistant and is passionate about the care and well being of children. She has worked with children that can’t speak, with children that can’t hear and with children that have everything to children in foster care. She has worked in city centre schools, in the wealthy suburbs and in schools with one room in the middle of nowhere. As she puts it: If I could just write something that makes some children smile then I will have really done something good with my life. Suzi has real vision for what children want and the skill to access those fertile imaginations. She is also emerging as a talented columnist for grown ups!
Suzi's first picture book LITTLE ONE is to be published by Simon and Schuster in 2011. Little One is not keen to go to bed, she'd much rather be an explorer or a pirate...This enchanting bedtime story is beautifully illustrated by Rosie Reeve.
SGB
Lauren Oliver was 25 when she wrote BEFORE I FALL two years ago and an editorial assistant at Razorbill, Puffin, NYC. A graduate of the University of Chicago and the MFA program at New York University, she is now a full-time writer and lives in Brooklyn, New York. Lauren writes with composure, clarity and wit and is certainly a star to watch. She has a fierce collection of shoes, is wildly entertaining and gorgeous. As well as writing, she is a passionate runner, cook and traveller. But we still like her.
BEFORE I FALL
BEFORE I FALL her stand out debut novel (The Lovely Bones meets Groundhog Day) is an accessible high-concept novel voiced by sixteen year old Sam, who dies in a car crash on the night she was supposed to lose her virginity. We witness this and also her reliving the day of her death seven times... each time trying to figure out how to live life differently.
Praise for BEFORE I FALL:
"This story races forward, twisting in a new direction every few pages, its characters spinning my emotions from affection to frustration, anger to compassion. You'll have no choice but to tear through this book!"
Jay Asher, author of the New York Times bestseller Thirteen Reasons Why
"I loved this engaging, compelling, heartbreaking novel, and can't see how any reader could fail to be won over by Sam as she relives her last day again and again and again. I didn't want Before I Fall to end."
Carolyn Mays, Director of Fiction, Hodder
"Before I Fall is smart, complex, and heartbreakingly beautiful. Lauren Oliver has written an extraordinary debut novel about what it means to live - and die."
Carolyn Mackler, author of Tangled
"Poignant . . . This tale of second chances will have you clinging on to your Kleenex"
Now Magazine
UK Publisher: Hodder, March 4th 2010
US Publisher: Harper Teen March 2nd 2010
DELIRIUM
Her second novel DELIRIUM documents a society which views love as a disease that can be cured. Lena cannot wait for her treatment as she believes it will save her from a life full of pain. But this is before she falls in love. A fast-paced and no less emotional journey, it's a great second novel.
DELIRIUM will be published simultaneously in US and UK Spring 2011.
SGB
GERVASE PHINN
Bestselling author Gervase Phinn has written a perceptive and moving story of a boy coming to terms with loss and learning to face life's challenges. Gervase spent 10 years as a school inspector and he is the author of the bestselling DALES SERIES published by Penguin and many children's anthologies.
A BIT OF HERO
Trumpeter and ace footballer Tom has lost all his interest in playing now that he's lost his dad. There's a big bully at school, Mum is finding new male friends, but Tom just wants his fireman dad back. Will he find the same courage his father showed, stand up to the bully and look for the best in life?
UK Publisher: Anderson Press, March 2009
DT
Lowri Potts was worked in the film and TV industry, in education, publishing and theatre. She works with children in the voluntary sector, including recently setting up the Scottish chapter of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI). JUGGERNAUT is her first novel, for children, and she is also working on the libretto of an opera, collaborating with composer Sally Beamish.
JUGGERNAUT
Thirteen-year old Jack MacDonald is grief stricken at the sudden death of his father, Ted, who was the heart and soul of their small family haulage company based in the North East of Scotland. When he realises that the business is facing financial ruin, Jack tries to persuade his American mum, Holly, to take Ted's place at the wheel of the Ark, their magnificently decorated Juggernaut. When his Mum finally relents and learns to drive the Ark, she tells him she wants to meet the challenge alone.
Furious and hurt at being excluded from her plans, Jack secretly stows away in the refrigerated trailer on Holly's trip to collect her first cargo of fish from the port at Fraserburgh. So begins Jack's adventures in the great Juggernaut which will take him the length of England, into France and beyond. He adores the life on the open road but he also sees the darker side of the truckers' world, in particular a fellow trucker determined to make trouble for Jack and his Mum. But it is when Jack bumps into a young stowaway - a victim of people trafficking, alone and in great danger - that he is forced to take matters into his own hands, including actually taking the wheel of the Juggernaut himself.
Publishing rights available
LL
Rebecca Promitzer trained as a scriptwriter. She lives in London. This is her debut novel
THE PICKLE KING
Bea Klednik lives in Elbow, where it rains all summer. Most people leave to go somewhere sunny, but there are always a few misfit kids left behind who haven't got money or parents. Because the friends they normally spend time with have gone, the school insists that they get together during the summer.
Bea is desperate to leave Elbow, so she decides to enter a photography competition for a trip to Florida. But when Sam shows her a dead body he's just found in a derelict house, something strange happens to her camera.
The mystery deepens. Who killed the owner of the factory that makes Bea's favourite chilli relish? Why is the last train to Elbow still stuck out of town, rusting on its tracks? What's the mystery of the ring they’ve found, in the shape of a castle, and why are they being chased for it? The answers are rooted in the history of this Twin Peaks-ish town.
UK publisher: Chicken House, May 2009
US publisher: Scholastic, 2010
SGB & MD
Christopher Russell was longlisted for The Guardian Children's Fiction Award 2005 and The Waterstone's Children's Book Prize 2006
Christopher Russell was a postman when he had his first radio play broadcast in 1975, having given up a job in the civil service to do shift work and have more daytime hours for writing. Since 1980, he has been a full-time television and radio script writer, and, more recently a children's novelist. His wife Christine has always been closely involved with his work, storylining and script editing, and has television credits of her own. THE QUEST OF THE WARRIOR SHEEP is the first book they have written together.
THE QUEST OF THE WARRIOR SHEEP
This is a super-funny, super-crazy crime caper with five rare-breed sheep! A silver object falls mysteriously from the sky and lands on Sal, a matronly Southdown ewe who lives happily with her sheep friends on Eppingham Farm. The sheep are convinced that an ancient ovine prophecy is being fulfilled. They must go North (so to Scotland, perhaps?) on a mission to aid Lord Aries, Sheep of all Sheepdom, Ram of Rams, in his battle against the powers of darkness in the shape of Lambad the Bad. Thus the Eppingham Posse of Rare Breed Warriors is born. In fact, the silver object is a mobile phone, dropped from a hot air balloon by Luke and Neil, who have been stealing bank money over the internet. They need that phone back to hide the evidence. And a couple of woolbags aren't going to stand in their way! The chase is on...
"Hilarious crime caper involving a gang of sheep and a mobile phone... what more could you ask for?" Books Monthly
UK publisher: Egmont, March 2010
SCARPER JACK AND THE BLOOD STAINED ROOM
Sweep's boy Jack is working inside a chimney when he overhears a murder being planned. He knows when and where it's going to happen but will anyone believe him if he tries to tell? Leaping and scrambling across the roof tops, he finds the appointed place. But before he can see or hear any more, an unseen assailant knocks him unconscious. The bloody murder is committed inside a locked building. Then Jack gets a further shock: his own no-good father is involved.
With the help of two unexpected friends – posh boy Rupert and sewer rat April – Jack sets out to track down the murderer and solve what the press are calling the 'impossible crime.' Very soon, though, he discovers that it’s dangerous to know too much.
This Victorian adventure story for 8 to 12 year olds is the first in an intended series about Jack and his gang. In the second they will save an innocent man from being hanged for murder. Jack will use his amazing agility to escape from Newgate jail and April will lead the rescued man to safety through the sewers. But only after they have snatched him from under the noses of the hangman and the expectant crowd.
UK Publisher: Puffin, March 2008
Mimi Thebo is an American of Cajun descent, now living and working in England. She has been a copywriter, a cowgirl and a cocktail waitress but is currently a lecturer in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University College.
A third thought-provoking novel from this lively new author. Artie has everything. His parents are making a serious fortune for themselves as sports agents, they've got a dream house with every kind of toy and gizmo a kid could ever desire, and Artie and his younger brother and sister (the twins) go to glamorous parties every weekend in designer clothes, where they hang out with sporting celebrities! Oh, and did I mention Artie's own phenomenal football ability? He's already got some premiership talent scouts watching him. In spite of all this, Artie's miserable. Why? Well, he hardly sees his successful parents, never gets to spend much time in their dream home and he and his best mate, Matt, aren't getting on so well. In fact, having school days with Matt and weekends with his parents is like living in two separate worlds. Grandad is the only thing that holds these worlds together. But Grandad's loopiness is getting worse. And only Artie knows! Set in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, this is a novel about a boy discovering the really important things in life -- and teaching everyone around him as he learns.
"a book that gives you a lump in the throat and then a warm glow. Empathetic, vivid and humane". Sunday Times on WIPE OUT.
UK Publisher: HarperCollins, February 2005
Nobody wants to play with Lucy on her first day in school. So her teacher gives her some chalks and Lucy begins to draw animals on the playground. She doesn't notice Zack and Ibrahim sitting at opposite ends of a nearby bench, watching her. As the three stories progress, Lucy, Zack and Ibrahim overcome the awkwardness of being alone at a new school, and become the best of friends, drawing together.
UK Publisher: Walker Books, 2005
HIT THE ROAD, JACK
Mimi's second book for HarperCollins is a gritty look at homelessness. Jack is determined to find his missing father when his mother decides to remarry. He tracks him down to the seamy side of town and an underworld that has no place in modern society. Eventually, he tracks him down. But Jack soon wishes that he had never tried.
Although this tackles a tough subject, HIT THE ROAD JACK is packed with humour and hope. Jack is a bit of a whizz-kid geek, but despite this he makes some sincere and unusual friends. Friends he will soon need to rely upon...
WIPE OUT
This was Mimi's first children's title and WIPE OUT is a novel exploring a young boy's grief, set against a colourful background of surfing. Eleven-year-old Billy's mother has just died and it has drained all the colour away from Billy's world. Sent to stay with his grey Auntie Mary whose dull blue house is shrouded in fog, Billy dreams of his vibrant surfer mother as he sleeps away his grief. For though Billy's mother is dead, her joyful personality pervades the whole story.
The author confronts the themes of loss and change in a most vibrant and original way. Her writing is sensual -- colour, taste, smell, touch and sound all leap from the page. She shows how different people handle loss and change differently, and how they learn to relate to each other in new ways. Mimi’s writing style is simple, sparse yet poetic, reminiscent of David Almond and Berlie Doherty. WIPE OUT was adapted for the BBC by another MBA writer Barbara Cox. She won a BAFTA for her adaptation.
UK Publisher: HarperCollins, 2003
SGB
Catherine is a prodigiously talented teenager. In 2002, when she was 16, her debut novel MIRROR DREAMS was a launch title of a new Young Adult list under the Orbit imprint at TimeWarner. Two sequels have been published, MIRROR WAKES and RAVEN HUNT. WAYWALKERS kicked off a new series where Lucifer is trying to rescue Earth from a pantheistic plot, and its sequel TIMEWALKERS was published in 2004.
TIMEKEEPERS
This is the follow-up novel to WAYWALKERS, which continues the tale of the plots and intrigues among the family of the gods. With the aid of the Pandora Spirits, the ender Gods have taken a giant step toward freeing the dread lord Cronus. It seems that Earth’s only hope rests with Sam Linnfer (a.k.a. Lucifer) and the power of the Light bestowed on him by Time. But unleashing the Light could have deadly consequences for Sam. For to do so, he must toughen the mind of every human on Earth. To save their souls, he may have to destroy himself.
UK Publisher: TimeWarner, 2004
THE EXTRAORDINARY AND UNUSUAL ADVENTURES OF HORATIO LYLE
In Victorian London at the height of the industrial revolution, Horatio Lyle is a former Special Constable with a passion for science and invention. He's also an occasional, but reluctant, sleuth. The truth is that he'd rather be in his lab tinkering with dangerous chemicals and odd machinery than running around the cobbled streets of London trying to track down stolen goods. But when Her Majesty's Government calls, Horatio swaps his microscope for a magnifying glass, fills his pockets with things that explode and sallies forth to unravel a mystery of a singularly extraordinary nature. Thrown together with a reformed (i.e. 'caught') pickpocket called Tess, and a rebellious (within reason) young gentleman called Thomas, Lyle and his faithful hound, Tate, find themselves pursuing an ancient Chinese plate, a conspiracy that reaches to the highest levels of polite society and a dangerous enemy who may not even be human. Solving the crime will be hard enough - surviving would be a bonus...
Further titles in this series: THE OBSIDIAN DAGGER, THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE
Foreign sales to: Italy, France, Germany, Japan, Holland, China.
MD