And the winners were…..

JRR tolkeinI hope you enjoyed the Ceremony – it was a very busy, and fun time.  There was so much to do -including uploading to the new Flikr feed – that announcing the winners on this website was a little delayed. So without further ado – the winner of the Junior Award was JRR Tolkien for The Hobbit, and for the Senior Award it was Douglas Adams for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

TolkienObviously, with both of our authors being deceased, nobody was present at the ceremony to get the prizes.  However, Julie Crisp, former editor at Pan MacMillan who worked on the rerelease of his books, sent us this moving tribute to Douglas Adams, which was read out, and which emphasized how his books have remained current today:

DouglasAdams

‘It’s thrilling to hear that The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has won the TSBA Senior Award and even more so that it was voted on by the students themselves. Considering the first book was published in the late 70s it’s a testament to the wit and wisdom of Douglas that these books are just as relevant, warm, funny and original to generations of readers today as they were when they were first published.  I, unfortunately, never got to work with Douglas but did get to look after the books and work on the new editions which were released in 2009. I’ve been a huge fan of the books since I was a child and discovered during my management of them that for readers like Russell T Davies, Neil Gaiman, Stephen Fry and even Elon Musk (one of the most influential tech people today and the inspiration for Marvel’s Tony Stark) the books and characters played a huge part in their teen years and hold a special place in their hearts.

Douglas was a visionary. He would have blown a gasket at modern technology today. And Adamswould, no doubt, have had a huge amount of fun on social media. He was not a natural writer – he really had to work at it. One of his most famous quotes is: “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound as they make as they go by.”  He did not find writing easy. His creativeness was almost too much to be constrained on the page by words alone.  But he persevered. I love this quote from the man himself: “He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which.”  It’s because of this self-deprecating humour, his energy, his dedication and his very clear and never-ending wonder at humanity and the universe that he left us the legacy of an enduring and engaging timeless series that will, hopefully, continue to delight new generations of readers well into the future.

 

 

Ceremony Guest Author – Matt Dickinson

Matt DickinsonOur third guest author is Matt Dickinson – whom some of you have already had the privilege of meeting when he visited your school.  Matt has written the very exciting book The Everest Files, which is the first in a trilogy.  By the time of the Awards Ceremony on 9 March, his second book, North Face, will be published.  This will continue the story of Ryan Hart, whom we have been reading about in The Everest Files.

What makes Matt’s book so interesting is that he himself has climbed Everest, and so we know that all of the scenes on the mountain are absolutely authentic.  Matt has also been a Dickinsoncameraman for National Geographic and the Discovery Channel, amongst others, so he has a wide experience of travelling to exciting places. He also continues to climb mountains.  You can find out more about Matt and the books he has written and films he has made on his website here: http://www.mattdickinson.com/   Do look out for the sequels to The Everest Files, or read his other exciting trilogy, the Mortal Chaos series.  We are all looking forward to meeting Matt at the Ceremony!

 

Ceremony Guest Author – Philip Reeve

Philip ReevePhilip Reeve is an author who has a long history of writing excellent science fiction books. Mortal Engines, first published in 2001, has been one of my personal favourites for a long time.  So successful was this book that three sequels were published – Predator’s Gold, Infernal Devices and A Darkling Plain.  Then a prequel was added – Fever Crumb – which itself spawned two sequels of its own.  The world we see in Mortal Engines, of cities on the move, preying on each other, is very exciting and very believable.  If you have enjoyed Mortal Engines, do go on to read the sequels.  And watch out for his newest book, Rail Head, which is published this month. It Mortal Enginessounds as if it is related to the world of Mortal Engines, with sentient trains, and I can’t wait to read it!  Read more about Philip Reeve and his new book on his website here: http://www.philip-reeve.com/

Ceremony Guest Author – Paul Dowswell

Paul Dowswell Paul Dowswell is one of the three authors we are lucky enough to be hosting at the Trinity Awards Ceremony this year.  Paul was at our inaugural ceremony last year as well, with his book Eleven Eleven.  This year, Powder Monkey is on our Junior Award shortlist, an exciting story of a young boy called Sam Witchall who joins the navy at the time of the Napoleonic wars, when England and France were at war.  If you have read this book – and you probably have by now – you will agree that it is really exciting.  If you want to find out more about the author, please visit his website here: http://www.pauldowswell.co.uk/  On the website, you will see that Powder MonkeyPaul enjoys writing historical novels, many of which will be on your school library shelves already.  If you liked Powder Monkey, and Paul’s writing, then go on to read Auslander (set in Nazi Germany), Sektion 20 (set in Communist East Berlin) and Red Shadow, set in Stalin’s Russia in 1941, or Cabinet of Curiosities, set in Renaissance Prague.

Idea – teacher champions for each short-listed book

At KGS, one of our English teachers came up with the idea of recruiting ‘teacher champions’ for each of the short-listed titles. Given that most of the books aren’t new, there’s no reading required, just a willingness to promote a book they love. We’re featuring a teacher & pupil TSBA book review a month in the school newsletter and hoping the teacher champion will support activities around ‘their’ title. I’m hoping to interest some of the new teachers as it will help to raise their profile etc.

Markus Zusak’s acceptance message

At the awards ceremony on 11 March Annie Eaton, Fiction Publisher at Random House Children’s Books, read out this message from Markus Zusak, winner of the TSBA Senior Award 2015 for The Book Thief:

Hi everyone at Trinity, and thanks for giving The Book Thief this award.

I’m surprised and thrilled, and quite amazed.

I thought The Book Thief would be by far my least successful book. I imagined someone reading it and trying to get someone else to read it. The other person would ask, ‘Well, what’s it about?’

Then what do you do?

All you can say is, ‘Well – it’s set in Nazi Germany, it’s narrated by Death, nearly everyone dies – oh, and it’s 580 pages long, you’ll love it!’

So, as you can see, I never had high hopes. I thought this book would sink without a trace, so I’m honoured to receive this award. Despite my low hopes for success, I knew at some point that The Book Thief meant everything to me, and I think it still does. Thank you for allowing a book that means everything to me mean something to you. I couldn’t be happier.

Thank you again, and all my best from down here in Sydney,

Markus

Winner of the Junior Creative response – Nikolas’s composition

Nikolas from Latymer Upper stunned everyone at the awards by performing his original composition on the piano, which is a response to the book ‘When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit’.  Judith Kerr was in the audience, and she was so impressed that she asked for a copy of the composition to be sent to her – an enormous compliment for Nikolas.  Listen for yourself to him playing his beautiful composition with help from his talented friend Tianrun on violin. Both boys, you will be amazed to know, are only in Year 7 – a bright future is ahead for both of them!

And the winners are…

 

Private PeacefulFeed_the_Minds_photo

The winner of the inaugural TSBA 2015 Junior Award was Michael Morpurgo for Private Peaceful.

the book thiefmarkus-zusak

The winner of the Senior Award was Markus Zusak for The Book Thief.

A separate account of the ceremony with photos will follow, but just to say that we were honoured to have Michael Morpurgo at the Awards in person to pick up his prize.  Markus Zusak sent a message via his Publisher, Annie Eaton.