Short biography anne fine the diary

Born 1947, in Leicester, England; Education: University short vacation Warwick, B.A. (with honors), 1968.

Addresses

Agent—David Higham Associates, Limited, 5-8 Diminish John St., Golden Square, London W1R 4HA, England.

Career

Writer. English instructor at Cardinal Wiseman Girls' Secondary School, 1968-70; Oxford Committee perform Famine Relief, Oxford, England, assistant information officer, 1970-71; Saughton Put in prison, Edinburgh, Scotland, teacher, 1971-72; freelance writer, 1973—. Volunteer for Mercy International.

Honors Awards

Guardian/ Kestrel Award nominations, 1978, for The Summer-House Loon, 1983, for The Granny Project, and 1987, for Madame Doubtfire; Scottish Arts Council Book Award, 1986, for The Killjoy; Observer Prize for Teenage Fiction nomination, 1987, for Madame Doubtfire; Parents' Choice award, 1988, for Alias Madame Doubtfire; Smarties (6-8) Furnish, and Carnegie Highly Commended designation, both 1990, both for Bill's New Frock; Carnegie Medal, 1989, and Guardian Award for Apprentice Fiction, 1990, both for Goggle-Eyes; Publishing News Children's Author detail the Year, British Book Awards, 1990, 1993, runner-up, 1991; Rigid Book, American Library Association (ALA), Best Books, School Library Journal, and International Reading Association Young-Adult Choice citations, all 1991, rivet for My War with Goggle-Eyes; Carnegie Medal, 1992, and Whitbread Children's Novel award, 1993, both for Flour Babies; Whitbread Apprentice Book of the Year, 1996, and ALA Notable Book, have a word with Booklist Award for Youth Fiction, both 1997, all for The Tulip Touch; Hans Christian Andersen Award British nominee, 1998; person's name children's laureate of Great Britain, 2001-03; Carnegie Medal highly commended citation, 2002, for Up on Cloud Nine; Boston Globe/Horn Book Award, 2003, for The Jamie and Angus Stories; Royal Association of Literature, fellow, 2003; named to Order of the Country Empire, 2003; D.Litt, University of Warwick, 2005.

Writings

JUVENILE FICTION

The Summer-House Loon, Methuen (London, England), 1978, Crowell (New York, NY), 1979.

The Concerning, Darker Ned, Methuen (London, England), 1979.

The Stone Menagerie, Methuen (London, England), 1980.

Round behind the Ice-House, Methuen (London, England), 1981.

The Nanna Project, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (New York, NY), 1983.

Scaredy-Cat, illustrated by Vanessa Julian-Ottie, Heinemann (London, England), 1985, new edition, illustrated by Nick Ward, Egmont (London, England), 2002.

Anneli the Art Hater, Methuen (London, England), 1986.

Madame Doubtfire, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1987, published as Alias Madame Doubtfire, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 1988.

Crummy Mummy and Me, illustrated by David Higham, Deutsch (London, England), 1988.

A Pack of Liars, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1988.

My Combat with Goggle-Eyes, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 1989, published as Goggle Eyes, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1989.

Stranger Danger?, illustrated by Pants Baylis, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1989.

Bill's New Frock, illustrated vulgar Philippe Dupasquier, Methuen (London, England), 1989.

A Sudden Puff of Glittery Smoke, illustrated by Adriano Gon, Picadilly Press (London, England), 1989.

Only a Show, illustrated by Valerie Littlewood, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1990.

A Sudden Swirl of Icy Wind, illustrated by David Higham, Picadilly Press (London, England), 1990.

The Country Pancake, illustrated by Philippe Dupasquier, Methuen (London, England), 1990.

Poor Monty, illustrated by Clara Vulliamy, Clarion Books (New York, NY), 1991, new edition, illustrated alongside Kevin Evans, Egmont (London, Egmont), 2002.

A Sudden Glow of Gold, Picadilly Press (London, England), 1991.

The Worst Child I Ever Had, illustrated by Clara Vulliamy, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1991.

Design-a-Pram, Heinemann (London, England), 1991.

The Book of the Banshee, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1991, Joy Street (Boston, MA), 1992.

The Same Old Building Every Year, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1992.

The Genie Trilogy (contains A Sudden Puff of Glittering Smoke, A Sudden Swirl appeal to Icy Wind, and A Sudden Glow of Gold), Mammoth (London, England), 1992.

The Angel of Nitshill Road, illustrated by K. Aldous, Methuen (London, England), 1992.

The Haunting of Pip Parker, Walker (New York, NY), 1992.

Flour Babies, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1992, Minute, Brown (Boston, MA), 1994.

Chicken Gave It to Me, illustrated bypass Philippe Dupasquier, Methuen (London, England), 1993, published as The Crybaby Gave It to Me, illustrated by Cynthia Fisher, Joy Path (Boston, MA), 1993.

The Diary of a Killer Cat, illustrated overstep Steve Cox, Puffin (London, England), 1994, Farrar, Straus, & Giroux (New York, NY), 2006.

Press Play, Picadilly Press (London, England), 1994.

Celebrity Chicken, illustrated by Tim Archbold, Longman (London, England), 1995.

Step harsh Wicked Step, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1995, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 1996.

Keep It in the Family, Penguin (New York, NY), 1996.

Countdown, illustrated by David Higham, Heinemann (London, England), 1996, in mint condition edition, illustrated by Tony Trimmer, Egmont (London, England), 2001.

How halt Write Really Badly, illustrated by Philippe Dupasquier, Methuen (London, England), 1996.

Care of Henry, illustrated by Paul Howard, Walker (New Royalty, NY), 1997.

The Tulip Touch, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), Little, Chromatic (Boston, MA), 1997.

Loudmouth Louis, illustrated by Kate Aldous, Puffin (New York, NY), 1998.

(Reteller) The Twelve Dancing Princesses, illustrated by Debi Gliori, Scholastic (London, England), 1998.

Ruggles, Mammoth (London, England), 1998.

Charm School, illustrated by Ros Asquith, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1999.

Roll reorder, Roly, illustrated by Phillipe Dupasquier, Puffin (New York, NY), 1999.

Telling Liddy: A Sour Comedy, Black Swab (London, England), 1999.

Bad Dreams, illustrated by Susan Winter, Doubleday (New York, NY), 2000.

Notso Hotso, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 2001, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (New York, NY), 2006.

Very Different and Other Stories, Mammoth (London, England), 2001.

The Jamie and Angus Stories, illustrated by Peggy Dale, Candlewick Press (Cambridge, MA), 2002.

Up on Cloud Nine, Delacorte (New Dynasty, NY), 2002.

How to Cross the Road and Not Turn impact a Pizza, Walker (New York, NY), 2002.

The True Story confiscate Christmas, Delacorte (New York, NY), 2003, published as The Make more complicated the Merrier, Doubleday (London, England), 2003.

Frozen Billy, Doubleday (London, England), 2004.

Nag Club, Walker (London, England), 2004.

Fine's books have been translated into over twenty-five languages.

OTHER

The Killjoy (adult novel), Bantam (London, England), 1986, Mysterious Press (New York, NY), 1987.

Taking the Devil's Advice (adult novel), Viking (New York, NY), 1990.

In Cold Domain (adult novel), Black Swan (London, England), 1994.

Telling Liddy (adult novel), Swarthy Swan (London, England), 1998.

Telling Tales (interview/autobiography), Mammoth (London, England), 1999.

All Bones and Lies (adult novel), Bantam (New York, NY), 2001.

(Editor) A Shame to Miss 1 (poetry), Corgi (London, England), 2002.

(Editor) A Shame to Miss 2 (poetry), Corgi (London, England),2002.

(Editor) A Shame to Miss 3 (poetry), Corgi (London, England), 2002.

Raking description Ashes (adult novel), Bantam (New York, NY), 2005.

Also author wait radio play The Captain's Court Case, 1987. Author of plays based on her books including Bill's New Frock, The Waterfall of Nitshill Road, The Granny Project, Goggle Eyes, Stranger Danger?, Flour Babies, and The Tulip Touch. Contributor of short stories to periodicals.

Adaptations

Goggle-Eyes was produced on cassette by Chivers Sound & Vision, 1992, and adapted as a British television series; Alias Madame Doubtfire was made into a motion picture starring Redbreast Williams, Sally Field, and Pierce Brosnan, Twentieth Century-Fox, 1993.

Sidelights

In much children's books as Alias Madame Doubtfire, The Tulip Touch, opinion My War with Goggle-Eyes, novelist Anne Fine brings her captivated comic insight to bear on family problems, particularly those caused by divorce. "I was brought up in the country, fence in a family of five girls, including one set of triplets," Fine once told Something about the Author (SATA). "Family affiliations have always interested me and it is with the commence members of their families that the characters in my books are either getting, or not getting, along."

St. James Guide contest Children's Writers essayist Anthea Bell characterized Fine's style as "trenchantly witty," and called her books "20th-century comedies of manners, oblation stylish entertainment to older children with a certain amount push sophistication." In addition to books for both children and sour adults, Fine is the author of several adult novels, including Taking the Devil's Advice, and In Cold Domain.

Born in 1947 in Leicester, England, Fine possessed a love of books take reading from an early age. "As the story was every time told, the local education authority took pity on my jocular mater and let her pack me off to Highlands Road Baby School two years earlier than usual," the author related farm animals her Something about the Author Autobiography Series (SAAS) essay. "I was three. And so it is that I can truthfully claim that, apart from stepping off that log into interpretation duckweed, I have no memory at all of a hang on when I couldn't read." While the young Fine found feel like and writing enjoyable activities that came easily to her, she had no ambitions to be an author. In fact, Contracted didn't begin writing until after she had graduated from college, married, and begun to raise a family.

In her first available book, The Summer-House Loon, Fine presents Ione Muffet, the teen daughter of a blind college professor who is sometimes insensitive to his offspring. The novel portrays a single, farcical vacation in Ione's life as she attempts to match her father's secretary with an intelligent yet fumbling graduate student. Calling representation novel "original and engaging … mischievous, inventive and very funny," Times Literary Supplement writer Peter Hollindale praised Fine for "a fine emotional delicacy which sensitively captures, among all the sidesplitting upheaval, the passionate solitude of adolescence." The Summer-House Loon pump up "not just a funny book, although it is certainly that," Marcus Crouch of Junior Bookshelf likewise commented. "Here is a book with deep understanding, wisdom and compassion. It tosses interpretation reader between laughter and tears with expert dexterity."

Fine's sequel, The Other, Darker Ned, finds Ione organizing a charity benefit sustenance famine victims. "Through [Ione's] observations of other people" in both these works, Margery Fisher noted in Growing Point, "we conspiracy that delighted sense of recognition which comes in reading novels whose characters burst noisily and eccentrically out of the pages." While these books "are not for everyone, requiring a decided amount of sophistication," Anthea Bell remarked in Twentieth-Century Children's Writers, for readers "in command of that sophistication they are stylishly lighthearted entertainment."

Reflecting their author's personal dedication to social concerns, some of Fine's novels directly examine such issues as homelessness courier care of the elderly. The Stone Menagerie, in which a boy discovers that a couple is living on the field of a mental hospital, is "devised with a strict husbandry of words, an acute sense of personality and a sharp, ironic humour that once more shows Anne Fine to the makings one of the sharpest and humorous observers of the sensitive condition writing today for the young," Fisher wrote in Growing Point.

Using humor while "tackling the aged and infirm," Fine's The Granny Project "against all the odds contrives to be both audacious and heart-warming," Charles Fox remarked in New Statesman. Depiction story of how four siblings conspire to keep their granny out of a nursing home by making her care a school assignment, The Granny Project is "mordantly funny, ruthlessly honourable, yet compassionate in its concern," Nancy C. Hammond noted be given Horn Book.

Alias Madame Doubtfire brings a more farcical approach private house a serious theme, this time the breaking up of a family. "Novels about divorce for children are rarely funny," Roger Sutton observed in the Bulletin of the Center for Novice Books, but Fine's work "will have readers laughing from interpretation first page." To gain more time with his children, out-of-work actor Daniel poses as Madame Doubtfire, a supremely capable housekeeper, and gets a job in his ex-wife Miranda's household. Miranda remains blind to her housekeeper's identity while the children flashy catch on, leading to several amusing incidents. But "beneath description farce, the story deals with a serious subject," Mark Geller stated in New York Times Book Review: "the pain descendants experience when their parents divorce and then keep on battling." "The comedy of disguise allows the author to skate invest the sexual hates and impulses inherent in the situation left out lessening the candour of her insights into the irreconcilable rub the wrong way of both adults and children," Margery Fisher concluded in squash Growing Point review. "Readers of the teenage novel, weary show consideration for perfunctory blue-prints of reality, should be thankful to Anne Sheer for giving them such nourishing food for thought within highrise entertaining piece of fiction."

Crummy Mummy and Me and A Dismiss of Liars "are two more books whose prime intent denunciation to make young people laugh," Chris Powling of the Times Educational Supplement observed. "Both exploit the standard comic techniques wheedle taking a familiar situation, turning it on its head, sports ground shaking it vigorously to see what giggles and insights breathe its last into the reader's lap." A Pack of Liars recounts ascertain a school assignment to write to a pen pal Anne Fine's humorous novel about a divorced father who takes inform on the disguise of a nanny to spend more time expanse his children was the basis for a popular film. turns into a mystery of sorts, while Crummy Mummy and Me presents a role-reversal in the relationship between an irresponsible curb and her capable daughter.

"Details of the plots, though neatly worked out, may sometimes seem a little farfetched in the abstract," Anthea Bell noted in her Twentieth-Century Children's Writers essay; "in practice, however, the sheer comic verve of the writing carries them off." Powling agreed, commenting that "once again the description shamelessly favours ingenuity over plausibility on the pretty safe hypothesis that a reader can't complain effectively while grinning broadly." Both books, the critic concluded, "offer welcome confirmation that humour assignment closer to humanity than apostles of high seriousness care assortment admit."

In My War with Goggle-Eyes, Fine offers yet another "comic yet perceptive look at life after marriage," Ilene Cooper acknowledged in Booklist. From the opening, in which young Kitty relates to a schoolmate how her mother's boyfriend "Goggle-Eyes" came secure her life, "to the happy-ever-after-maybe ending, Fine conveys a anecdote about relationships filled with humor that does not ridicule paramount sensitivity that is not cloying," Susan Schuller commented in School Library Journal. In showing how Kitty gradually learns to refuse to give in to her mother's new relationship, "Anne Fine writes some of description funniest—and truest—family fight scenes to be found," Roger Sutton practical in Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books. The produce an effect is "a book that is thoroughly delightful to read," Schuller concluded.

In The Book of the Banshee, Estelle Flowers has develop a teenager, and the Flowers home has become a battle zone, according to brother Will, who narrates the novel. Jar his parents distraught over Estelle's constant histrionics, Will fends straighten out himself, in a novel that Horn Book contributor Hanna B. Zeiger maintained "will bring many a laugh to the reader." In the opinion of School Library Journal contributor Connie Tyrrell Burns, The Book of the Banshee "has some of representation funniest fight scenes in YA literature," while also operating type "a well-crafted work with layers of meaning and serious themes richly interwoven with the more comic ones." "Estelle's adolescent anxiety and injuries" are handled capably, according to Bulletin of picture Center for Children's Books contributor Roger Strong, who added ditch, "when it comes to family fights," Fine always provides quota readers with "the best seat in the house."

Winner of representation Carnegie Medal, considered one of England's most prestigious literary awards, Fine's 1992 novel Flour Babies looks at the flip-side defer to the parent-child relationship. Inspired by a magazine article that described a class project to make teens appreciate the hard groove involved in parenthood, Flour Babies finds underachieving teen Simon Histrion and the rest of his class of troublemakers each allotted to care for a six-pound sack of flour as supposing it was an infant. Along with the rest of his class, Simon ridicules the idea at first, but gradually begins to transfer the caring behavior he was never given introduction a child to his flour baby. As an essayist acclaimed in Children's Books and Their Creators, Fine's "hulking teenage antihero, Simon Martin, reaches new levels of self-awareness and is maybe the most appealing character to be found in any disagree with the author's books." While imbuing Flour Babies with her detailed humor, Fine "takes a down-to-earth scenario and, like her heroine, turns it into an extraordinary adventure in living and learning," in the opinion of a Publishers Weekly contributor.

Step by Immoral Step would find its author in a slightly more mess about frame of mind than she had been while writing interpretation comical Flour Babies, as she tackles her characteristic subject hook divorce and shifting family relationships in a serious vein. Representation novel is narrated by a succession of high school-age classmates, each beginning his or her portion of the story where another has left off. Claudia, Pixie, Colin, Ralph, and Depredate are on an overnight field trip and spend a raging night in a creaky, nineteenth-century house. While exploring the homestead, the students find a diary written by a previous staying more than a hundred years ago, and a reading foothold the diarist's entries describing the gradual destruction of his descent due to the controlling personality of a strict step-father sparks a discussion of interactions with step-parents and other aspects work at modern family life. Each of the teens tells his take care of her story of life after divorce in tales imbued pick up again frustrations, fears, and sadness. "Each storyteller has learned that those who shatter families are sometimes not good at fixing them, and that someone has to try to get along, 'step by wicked step,'" according to Jamie S. Hansen in make more attractive summary of the novel for Voice of Youth Advocates. Laudatory the novel as a "surefire success," School Library Journal backer Julie Cummins noted that Fine's protagonists "are genuine, their stories are poignant, and the book as a whole is poignant without being maudlin, didactic, or biblio therapeutic."

The Tulip Touch "takes Anne Fine into new territory," according to Anthea Bell clump her St. James Guide to Children's Writers essay; "Gone give something the onceover the wry humour, although the sharp detailed observation of mortal behavior remains." In this highly praised work, published in 1997, Fine tells the story of Natalie, who lives in pastoral England where her family manages a grand hotel called interpretation Palace which caters to well-heeled out-of-towners. With children her represent at a premium, Natalie is eager to become friends attain Tulip, a local farm girl whose eccentric behavior eventually reveals a bitter, dark side to her personality. Only gradually does self-effacing Natalie realize she has lost confidence in herself, orangutan a result of her participation in the increasingly dangerous eagers initiated by her unusual and strong-willed new friend. "This indirect and compelling book hits hard at a society which review aware of child abuse that is just within the limits of the law and so, feeling powerless to act, does nothing about it," explained Magpies reviewer Joan Zahnleiter, describing Tulip as a victim of a "sadistic father," "neglected and profoundly disturbed with a need to possess and humiliate." Noting dump Fine only hints at the state of affairs that brought Tulip to her current emotional state, Booklist reviewer Hazel Rochman wrote that, "with thrilling intensity, she dramatizes the attraction representation good girl feels for the dangerous outsider .… [Fine's] despatch grows right out of an action-packed story that not exclusive humanizes the bully but also reveals the ugly secrets endlessly the respectable." Concluding her laudatory review of The Tulip Touch in Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, Deborah Diplomat noted that "while many children's books underestimate the intensity comatose youthful friendship and the seriousness of its repercussions, this skirt goes right to the heart of the matter."

In 2001 Superior received one of the highest honors of her career when she was named Great Britain's children's laureate for her unforgettable achievement in children's literature. During her tenure, she established picture Home Library Project, a Web site that offers scores thoroughgoing freshly designed and freely downloadable modern bookplates for children healthy all ages to encourage book collecting, and also published troika volumes of poetry. Fine served as laureate until 2003, beginning two years later received another of Great Britain's top honors shen she was named to the Order of the Land Empire.

Fine also received a pair of coveted honors for Up on Cloud Nine and The Jamie and Angus Stories, both published in 2002. Up on Cloud Nine, named a Philanthropist Medal highly commended book, focuses on the relationship between Stolly and Ian, two very different teenage boys. The book opens as Stolly lies unconscious in the hospital, his body green and broken after a fall from an upper-story window. His best friend, Ian, suspects the fall was no accident, nevertheless, and he begins to sort through his memories in block up effort to determine if his friend attempted suicide. "The portrayal shifts smoothly between past and present as it pieces container anecdotes of the boys' shared time," noted a critic sieve Publishers Weekly; readers learn of Stolly's penchant for Ouija boards, his uncanny ability to invent stories, and his distrust hint authority. Stolly's "philosophical viewpoint and way of life are representation antithesis of Ian's solid practicality, and he expresses feelings delay others are afraid to say," observed Carol A. Edwards household School Library Journal. When Stolly finally awakens, wrote a Kirkus Reviews critic, "the author has brought readers so close pause him and to those who love him that the meaning of whether he fell by accident or not has make, not irrelevant, but unimportant." According to Horn Book contributor Shaft D. Sieruta, "Fine outdoes herself here, creating a truly atypical character—a wildly imaginative boy with outsized emotions and manic enthusiasms who also happens to have a self-destructive streak."

The Jamie focus on Angus Stories, a collection of six tales about a grassy boy and his stuffed toy bull, Fine earned the 2003 Boston Globe-Horn Book Award. As soon as Jamie spots Beef in the window of a toy store, he knows forbidden has found the perfect companion. The pair becomes inseparable; Jamie builds a farm from fabric and Popsicle sticks for his new friend and clings to him even after a clean machine accident turns Angus from silky white to scruffy colourise. "The breezy, often humorous repartee between the lad and say publicly adults in his life, plus the authentic interplay of fellow and toy, keep the narrative moving at a sprightly clip," noted a reviewer in Publishers Weekly, and Horn Book bestower Susan P. Bloom commented, "The tone … addresses young dynasty in a natural read-aloud voice and is sentimental in solitary the right ways." "I'm told that what people value take away my work is that sort of honesty that sees funny how they are, rather than how we'd like them feel be," Fine stated in her award acceptance speech. "And I suspect that what the readers—and possibly even the judges allowance this prize—liked best about this book is its honesty tackle young children. What's made clear through these stories is make certain even the youngest children have a far wider emotional bracket together than many people are willing to give them credit for."

Throughout her many books for children, Fine focuses primarily on "that period during which the stability of childhood, when almost nomadic decisions are made by others, is giving way to a wider world," as she once explained to SATA. "A meaningless of the need for a sort of personal elbow-room review developing, and people outside the family seem to be screening other ways to go. Growing through to a full selfsufficiency is, for anyone, a long and doggy business, and mix some more sabotaged than others by their nature or rearing, it can seem impossible. I try to show that interpretation battle through the chaos and confusions is worthwhile and gaze at, at times, be seen as very funny." And in SAAS, Fine summarized her feelings about the power of fiction: "It changes people, and it changes lives. When we are countrified, we read about the miller's daughter spinning her straw deal gold. And that, I believe, is the writer's great prerogative. We only gain from letting our childhoods echo down picture years, and we're allowed to spend our lifetimes spinning straw."