Brixton BookJam is streaming a “youth special” live at 7pm on Tuesday 29 September.
Authors taking part include Cressida Cowell, Piers Torday, Finbar Hawkins, Loris Owen, Jasbinder Bilan and Max Hawker. The renowned Bookshop Band will play.
Cressida Cowell is the Waterstones Children’s Laureate (2019 – 2022), and author and illustrator of the bestselling The Wizards of Once and How to Train Your Dragon books series. She is also an ambassador for the National Literacy Trust and the Reading Agency, a Trustee of World Book Day and a founder patron of the Children’s Media Foundation. She has won numerous prizes, including The Blue Peter Book Award. She will read from The Wizard of Once: Never and Forever
cressidacowell.co.uk | @CressidaCowell
Piers Torday’s first book for children, The Last Wild, was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Award and nominated for the CILIP – the UK’s library and information association – Carnegie Medal. His second book, The Dark Wild, won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize. There May Be A Castle was a People’s Book Award finalist and a Times Children’s Book of the Year. The Lost Magician was a Book of the Year in six national newspapers and won the Teach Primary Book Award. The follow up, The Frozen Sea, was published in 2019. Piers has also completed an unfinished novel by his late father Paul (author of Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, The Death of an Owl) and adapted The Box of Delights and A Christmas Carol for the stage.
pierstorday.co.uk | @PiersTorday | Insta @piers_torday
Finbar Hawkins grew up in Blackheath, London and now lives in Wiltshire. He is a creative director for Wallace and Gromit creators Aardman Animations in Bristol, where he makes fun things for children of all ages.
@finbar_hawkins
Born in Bolton and made in Zimbabwe, Loris Owen has lived and worked in several countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Animals and nature have always been a creative force in Loris’ writing, and you will always find a lovable animal somewhere in her stories.
@lorisowen | lorisowen.com | quicksmiths.com
Maximilian Hawker lives in Croydon. He is author of the novel Breaking the Foals, and the forthcoming Rory Hobble and the Voyage to Haligogen (both published by Unbound). Since childhood, he has suffered with severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and does media advocacy on behalf of the charity OCD Action. He also works full-time in frontline children’s social care, supporting looked-after children and care leavers.
maximilianhawker.com | @MaxHawker
Award-winning writer Jasbinder Bilan was born in a stable near the foothills of the Himalaya and, until she was 18 months, lived on a farm inhabited by a grumpy camel and a monkey called Oma. Her debut, Asha And The Spirit Bird was nominated for the Carnegie Medal 2019, Longlisted for The Branford Boase 2019, Longlisted for The Jhalak Prize 2020, shortlisted for The Waterstones Book Prize 2020 and won the Costa Children’s Book Award 2019. Jasbinder’s latest novel Tamarind And The Star Of Ishta is another magical realist adventure set in the Himalayas. available from September 2020.
jasbinderbilan.co.uk | @jasinbath | Insta: @jasbinderbilan
The Bookshop Band formed in 2010 out of a collaboration between an award winning independent bookshop and a group of musicians, writing songs inspired by the books of visiting authors. Thirteen studio albums later the band have now worked with over 150 authors from around the world, including Philip Pullman, Joanne Harris and Robert Macfarlane, and have toured hundreds of bookshops in the UK, Europe and North America. They have just released their first live album and are collaborating on an album with legendary rock musician, Pete Townshend of The Who.
thebookshopband.co.uk | @TheBookshopBand | Insta @bookshopband
Find out more at brixtonbookjam.com
