The Fire-Eaters
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The Fire-Eaters
''The Fire-Eaters'' is a 2003 children's novel by David Almond. Plot introduction The novel is set in 1962, before and during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Bobby Burns, who lives in the quiet coal-mining village of Keely Bay in Northumberland, has had a wonderful summer. But in autumn his father falls mysteriously ill, and he loathes his new school which is pervaded by bullying. Perhaps worst of all, Bobby is worried there will be a nuclear war. Bobby's wonder-working friend Ailsa Spink and McNulty the crazy fire-eater open Bobby's eyes to the possibility of miracles. Main characters *Robert 'Bobby' Burns *Mum *Dad *Joseph Connor *Ailsa Spink *McNulty, a fire-eater *Daniel Gower, a school friend of Bobby's *Mr Todd *Miss Bute Reception ''Kirkus Reviews'' wrote "Like the choicest of Almond, this is moody and layered." and "Breathtakingly and memorably up to Almond’s best." while ''Publishers Weekly'' concluded that "Sensitive readers will marvel at Almond's ability to show, not ...
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WikiProject Novels
A WikiProject, or Wikiproject, is a Wikimedia movement affinity group for contributors with shared goals. WikiProjects are prevalent within the largest wiki, Wikipedia, and exist to varying degrees within sister projects such as Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikidata, and Wikisource. They also exist in different languages, and translation of articles is a form of their collaboration. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CBS News noted the role of Wikipedia's WikiProject Medicine in maintaining the accuracy of articles related to the disease. Another WikiProject that has drawn attention is WikiProject Women Scientists, which was profiled by '' Smithsonian'' for its efforts to improve coverage of women scientists which the profile noted had "helped increase the number of female scientists on Wikipedia from around 1,600 to over 5,000". On Wikipedia Some Wikipedia WikiProjects are substantial enough to engage in cooperative activities with outside organizations relevant to the field at issue. For e ...
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Costa Book Awards
The Costa Book Awards were a set of annual literary awards recognising English-language books by writers based in UK and Ireland. Originally named the Whitbread Book Awards from 1971 to 2005 after its first sponsor, the Whitbread company, then a brewery and owner of restaurant chains, it was renamed when Costa Coffee, then a subsidiary of Whitbread, took over sponsorship. The companion Costa Short Story Award was established in 2012. Costa Coffee was purchased by the Coca-Cola Company in 2018. The awards were abruptly terminated in 2022. The awards were given both for high literary merit but also for works that are enjoyable reading and whose aim is to convey the enjoyment of reading to the widest possible audience. As such, they were considered a more populist literary prize than the Booker Prize, which also limits winners to literature written in the UK and Ireland. Awards were separated into six categories: Biography, Children's Books, First Novel, Novel, Poetry, and Shor ...
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Novels Set In Northumberland
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the la, novella, a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ''novellus'', diminutive of ''novus'', meaning "new". Some novelists, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Ann Radcliffe, John Cowper Powys, preferred the term "romance" to describe their novels. According to Margaret Doody, the novel has "a continuous and comprehensive history of about two thousand years", with its origins in the Ancient Greek and Roman novel, in Chivalric romance, and in the tradition of the Italian renaissance novella.Margaret Anne Doody''The True Story of the Novel'' New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996, rept. 1997, p. 1. Retrieved 25 April 2014. The ancient romance form was revived by Romanticism, especially the historica ...
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Fiction Set In 1962
Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditional narrow sense, "fiction" refers to written narratives in prose often referring specifically to novels, novellas, and short stories. More broadly, however, fiction encompasses imaginary narratives expressed in any medium, including not just writings but also live theatrical performances, films, television programs, radio dramas, comics, role-playing games, and video games. Definition Typically, the fictionality of a work is publicly marketed and so the audience expects the work to deviate in some ways from the real world rather than presenting, for instance, only factually accurate portrayals or characters who are actual people. Because fiction is generally understood to not fully adhere to the real world, the themes and context of ...
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British Children's Novels
British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, the English language as spoken and written in the United Kingdom or, more broadly, throughout the British Isles * Celtic Britons, an ancient ethno-linguistic group * Brittonic languages, a branch of the Insular Celtic language family (formerly called British) ** Common Brittonic, an ancient language Other uses *''Brit(ish)'', a 2018 memoir by Afua Hirsch *People or things associated with: ** Great Britain, an island ** United Kingdom, a sovereign state ** Kingdom of Great Britain (1707–1800) ** United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801–1922) See also * Terminology of the British Isles * Alternative names for the British * English (other) * Britannic (other) * British Isles * Brit (other) * Briton ( ...
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2003 British Novels
3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societies. Evolution of the Arabic digit The use of three lines to denote the number 3 occurred in many writing systems, including some (like Roman and Chinese numerals) that are still in use. That was also the original representation of 3 in the Brahmic (Indian) numerical notation, its earliest forms aligned vertically. However, during the Gupta Empire the sign was modified by the addition of a curve on each line. The Nāgarī script rotated the lines clockwise, so they appeared horizontally, and ended each line with a short downward stroke on the right. In cursive script, the three strokes were eventually connected to form a glyph resembling a with an additional stroke at the bottom: ३. The Indian digits spread to the Caliphate in the 9th ...
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Carnegie Medal (literary Award)
The Carnegie Medal is a British literary award that annually recognises one outstanding new English-language book for children or young adults. It is conferred upon the author by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP). CILIP calls it "the UK's oldest and most prestigious book award for children's writing". The Medal is named after the Scottish-born American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919), who founded more than 2,800 libraries in the English-speaking world, including at least one in more than half of British library authorities. It was established in 1936 by the British Library Association, to celebrate the centenary of Carnegie's birth and inaugurated in 1937 with the award to Arthur Ransome for ''Pigeon Post'' (1936) and the identification of two 'commended' books. The first Medal was dated 1936, but since 2007 the Medal has been dated by its year of presentation, which is now one or two years after publication. In 1955, the ...
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Guardian Award
The Guardian Children's Fiction Prize or Guardian Award was a literary award that annual recognised one fiction book written for children or young adults (at least age eight) and published in the United Kingdom. It was conferred upon the author of the book by ''The Guardian'' newspaper, which established it in 1965 and inaugurated it in 1967. It was a lifetime award in that previous winners were not eligible. At least from 2000 the prize was £1,500. The prize was apparently discontinued after 2016, though no formal announcement appears to have been made. Recent winners Piers Torday won the 2014 Guardian Prize, announced 13 November, for ''The Dark Wild'' from Quercus Publishing. It is the second book of a trilogy inaugurated by ''The Last Wild'', whose conclusion ''The Wild Beyond'' is forthcoming April 2015. The judges were ''Guardian'' children's book editor Julia Eccleshare and three British children's writers (as always): 2012 prize winner Frank Cottrell Boyce, Gillia ...
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Nestlé Smarties Book Prize
The Nestlé Children's Book Prize, and Nestlé Smarties Book Prize for a time, was a set of annual awards for British children's books that ran from 1985 to 2007. It was administered by BookTrust, an independent charity that promotes books and reading in the United Kingdom, and sponsored by Nestlé, the manufacturer of Smarties candy. It was one of the most respected and prestigious prizes for children's literature. There were three award categories defined by audience ages 0 to 5 years, 6 to 8 years, and 9 to 11 years (introduced in 1987 after two years with no single prize). Silver and bronze runners-up in each category were introduced in 1996 and designation of one overall winner was abandoned at the same time. Eligible books were written by UK citizens and residents and published during the preceding year (not precisely the calendar year). The shortlists were selected by a panel of adult judges, finally chaired by Julia Eccleshare, children's books editor for ''The Guardia ...
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WikiProject Books
A WikiProject, or Wikiproject, is a Wikimedia movement affinity group for contributors with shared goals. WikiProjects are prevalent within the largest wiki, Wikipedia, and exist to varying degrees within sister projects such as Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikidata, and Wikisource. They also exist in different languages, and translation of articles is a form of their collaboration. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CBS News noted the role of Wikipedia's WikiProject Medicine in maintaining the accuracy of articles related to the disease. Another WikiProject that has drawn attention is WikiProject Women Scientists, which was profiled by '' Smithsonian'' for its efforts to improve coverage of women scientists which the profile noted had "helped increase the number of female scientists on Wikipedia from around 1,600 to over 5,000". On Wikipedia Some Wikipedia WikiProjects are substantial enough to engage in cooperative activities with outside organizations relevant to the field at issue. For e ...
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Publishers Weekly
''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of Book Publishing and Bookselling". With 51 issues a year, the emphasis today is on book reviews. The magazine was founded by bibliographer Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliography ... Frederick Leypoldt in the late 1860s, and had various titles until Leypoldt settled on the name ''The Publishers' Weekly'' (with an apostrophe) in 1872. The publication was a compilation of information about newly published books, collected from publishers and from other sources by Leypoldt, for an audience of booksellers. By 1876, ''The Publishers' Weekly ...
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Kirkus Reviews
''Kirkus Reviews'' (or ''Kirkus Media'') is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus (1893–1980). The magazine is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fiction, nonfiction, and young readers' literature. ''Kirkus Reviews'', published on the first and 15th of each month; previews books before their publication. ''Kirkus'' reviews over 10,000 titles per year. History Virginia Kirkus was hired by Harper & Brothers to establish a children's book department in 1926. The department was eliminated as an economic measure in 1932 (for about a year), so Kirkus left and soon established her own book review service. Initially, she arranged to get galley proofs of "20 or so" books in advance of their publication; almost 80 years later, the service was receiving hundreds of books weekly and reviewing about 100. Initially titled ''Bulletin'' by Kirkus' Bookshop Service from 1933 to 1954, the title was ...
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