Elizabeth Laird (author) facts for kids
Elizabeth Laird (born in 1943) is a British author who writes exciting books for children and young adults. She also loves to travel and has collected many traditional stories, called folktales, from different parts of Ethiopia. Her books are very popular and have been translated into more than twenty languages around the world.
Contents
About Elizabeth Laird
Elizabeth Laird was born in New Zealand in 1943. Her father was from Scotland, and her mother was from New Zealand. In 1945, when Elizabeth was two years old, her family moved to Purley, a town near London, England.
Elizabeth had a younger brother who was born in 1947. He had severe disabilities and sadly passed away in 1949. This experience inspired her first children's novel, Red Sky in the Morning (published in 1988). The book explores themes of family and dealing with difficult situations.
Since 2010, Elizabeth Laird has been a judge for the Walter Scott Prize. This award celebrates the best historical fiction books. She has also received several awards for her writing. Her books have been nominated six times for the Carnegie Medal, which is a very important award for children's literature in Britain.
Elizabeth Laird's Books
Elizabeth Laird has written many different types of books, including novels for children, picture books, and collections of traditional stories.
Children's Novels
- Red Sky in the Morning (also known as Loving Ben) (1988)
- Kiss the Dust (1991)
- Hiding Out (1993)
- Secret Friends (1996)
- Jay (1997)
- Jake's Tower (2001)
- The Garbage King (2003)
- A Little Piece of Ground (with Sonia Nimr, 2003)
- Paradise End (2004)
- Secrets of the Fearless (2005)
- Oranges in No Man's Land (2006)
- Crusade (2007)
- Lost Riders (2008)
- The Witching Hour (2009)
- The Betrayal of Maggie Blair (2011)
- The Prince who Walked with Lions (2012), a story about Prince Alemayehu
- The Fastest Boy in the World (2014)
- Dindy and the Elephant (2015)
- Welcome to Nowhere (2017)
- Song of the Dolphin Boy (2018)
- A House Without Walls (2019)
Picture Books
- Rosy's Garden (1979)
- A Book of Promises (1999)
- Beautiful Bananas (2004)
- Grobblechops (2019)
Folkstory Collections
- When the World Began: Stories from Ethiopia (2001)
- Pea Boy: Stories from Iran (2009)
- The Jackal and the Rabbit: Fables of Kalilah and Dimnah (2013)
Short Stories
- Me and My Electric (1998)
- Hot Rock Mountain (2004)
The Ethiopian Story Collecting Project
In 1996, Elizabeth Laird started an amazing project called The Ethiopian Story Collecting Project. She worked with Michael Sargent, the British Council in Ethiopia, and the Ethiopian Ministry of Education. Their goal was to gather traditional stories from all over Ethiopia. They wanted to create reading materials in English for students in Ethiopian schools.
They collected more than 300 stories from every region of the country. These stories were then published in both English and Amharic (a language spoken in Ethiopia) on a website called www.ethiopianfolktales.com. There is also another website, www.ethiopianfolktalesforkids.com, which has a selection of these stories in simpler English. This site also includes exercises and audio recordings to help kids learn.
Elizabeth Laird wrote a book about her travels, the storytellers she met, and the stories themselves. It is called The Lure of the Honey Bird and was published in 2009.
Awards and Recognitions
Elizabeth Laird's books have won many awards and have been recognized for their quality:
- Red Sky in the Morning was Highly Commended for the Carnegie Medal.
- Hiding Out won the Smarties Young Judges Award.
- Jake's Tower was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.
- The Garbage King won the Scottish Arts Council Children's Book of the Year award and the Stockport Book award. It was also shortlisted for many other awards, including the Carnegie Medal and the Blue Peter Award.
- A Little Piece of Ground won the Hampshire Book Award and was shortlisted for the Southern Schools Book Award.
