What’s the best poetry for children?
Poetry recommendations for you’ve grown out of rhyming picture books and aren’t old enough for teen reads from The Book Doctor, including Laura Dockrill, Malorie Blackman, Sarah Crossan and Rachel Rooney
Welcome to our poetry-themed week – an overview
Catch up with everything we did in our themed poetry week 2015
Mars: leave it well alone!
Writer Paul Magrs has always had an affinity with Mars (not least because that’s how his surname is said). The planet has always been an infinite space for his dreams. Now, for the sake of our imagination - and even possible Martians - he’s hoping for a halt to explorations
Can children’s books help build a better world?
Author SF Said on how almost all the world’s problems come down to ‘us and them’ – and how children’s books can knock down the barriers
Mice in fiction (in honour of Danger Mouse) – Quiz
To celebrate the return of world-famous secret agent Danger Mouse to our screens, we have compiled a quiz on the best mice in fiction. Do you know your Danger Mouse from your Despereaux? Have a go at this quiz to find out!
Robert Muchamore: I reply to every single fan who emails me
The bestselling author of the CHERUB series promised to reply to every single email from a fan since publishing his first teen novel. Now, 11 years and 12 million copies sold later, he hasn’t broken his pledge. And here’s why
Which superhero are you? Quiz
Feel the urge to fly? Dream of having super-strength? Find out once and for all which superhero you are by taking our super quiz!
Katherine Rundell: ‘There’s a huge amount of joy to be gained from learning to steer towards fear’
The award-winning author of Rooftoppers has just published a new book set in the snowbound woods of Russia: The Wolf Wilder. Site member Lottie Longshanks got to ask Katherine Rundell about bravery, ballet, the Russian revolution and wolves
Your stories: A Good Day to be Rich
GeorgeFS: ‘Philip King was worth just over 37 billion dollars. Of course, it wasn’t enough. It never was. In a world where those with the most wealth quite literally made the rules, there was no room for slackers’
Laura Carlin wins the Bratislava children’s books illustration award 2015
In the UK’s first win in 20 years, illustrator Laura Carlin takes the grand prix in the world’s biggest children’s books illustration awards: the Biennial of Illustrations Bratislava (or BIB for short) 2015 with her books The Iron Man and A World of Your Own
Why young people need to talk about organ donation
Two years ago author Maria Farrer’s nephew lay critically ill in hospital waiting for heart transplant. Now in National Transplant Week, Maria recommends books exploring organ donation and urges everyone to register as a donor
Patrick Ness and his super-author team raise £200,000 for Syrian refugees
Patrick Ness has taken Twitter by storm, raising £200,000 (and counting) for Save The Children’s Syrian refugee crisis fund, with help of fellow authors including John Green, Derek Landy, Rainbow Rowell and David Nicholls
Your mobile phone is killing gorillas
Vet turned bestselling children’s author Gill Lewis reveals how our mobile phones connect all of us to the fate of the gorilla - and how the discovery inspired her novel, Gorilla Dawn
Neil Gaiman: ‘my parents didn’t have any kind of rules about what I couldn’t read’
Neil Gaiman is no stranger to having his books banned. Here the author of Coraline and The Graveyard Book talks about controversial books in libraries, censorship threats to graphic novels and why freedom of speech is not the freedom to harass
Why books are small but dangerous
Nicky Parker from Amnesty International explains how books open up whole wide worlds that some people don’t want us to know about – that’s why they’re censored, banned or removed