Grandma Gertie’s Haunted Handbag / Grandpa Bert and the Ghost Snatchers
1996
Space Race
1997
Aesop’s Fables
1998
Fangs
1998
Animal Avengers
1999
Dizzy’s Walk
1999
Don’t Be Afraid
1999
Marty Monster / We’re Going to Find the Monster
1999
I Want a Cuddle!
2001
Snow Dog
2001
Jessica Strange
2002
The Monster Crisp-Guzzler
2002
Sinclair, Wonder Bear
2003
Ellie and the Cat
2005
Publication Order of Graphic Novels
Noughts & Crosses: The Graphic Novel
2015
Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books
Just Sayin’: My Life in Words
2022
About Malorie Blackman
Dame Malorie Blackman is a British writer for children and young adults, best known for the “Noughts & Crosses” series, which is set in an alternative Britain and deals with racism. She has written more than seventy books, was the UK Children’s Laureate from 2013 to 2015 and won the PEN Pinter Prize in 2022.
Blackman was born in London in 1962 and grew up in Lewisham, one of five children of parents who had come to Britain from Barbados as part of the Windrush generation. She wanted to be an English teacher at school but became a systems programmer. Her first book, “Not So Stupid!”, a collection of horror and science fiction stories for young adults, was published in 1990. Early successes included “Hacker” and “Pig-Heart Boy”, which was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal. She adapted “Pig-Heart Boy” for a BBC television production that won a BAFTA.
“Noughts & Crosses” (2001) is set in a society where the dark-skinned Crosses hold power over the lighter-skinned noughts. It follows Sephy, a Cross, and Callum, a nought, who have been friends since childhood. Blackman has said that before this book the ethnicity of her characters had never been central to her plots. The novel was followed by “Knife Edge”, “Checkmate”, “Double Cross”, “Crossfire” and “Endgame” (2021), the sixth and final novel, along with three novellas. “Crossfire” was shortlisted for the Costa Children’s Book Award.
The first book has been adapted several times: for the Royal Shakespeare Company by Dominic Cooke in a production that toured in 2008, for Pilot Theatre by Sabrina Mahfouz, as a graphic novel by Ian Edginton and John Aggs, and as a BBC One television series first shown in March 2020. Her other novels for teenagers include “Boys Don’t Cry”, “Noble Conflict” and the science fiction thriller “Chasing the Stars”.
Blackman received the Eleanor Farjeon Award in 2005 and an OBE in 2008, and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009. In 2018 she co-wrote the “Doctor Who” episode “Rosa” with Chris Chibnall. Her memoir, “Just Sayin’: My Life in Words”, was published by Merky Books in 2022, and an exhibition on her career ran at the British Library from November 2023 to February 2024. She was made a dame in the 2026 King’s Birthday Honours for services to literature.
