Ways to Live Forever

The Ways to Live Forever film is due to be released in America this spring. Hurrah! It’s getting great reviews, and you can follow the film on Facebook and Twitter to find out more about screenings near you. Still no news of a UK release, I’m afraid.

There is also a stage play of Ways to Live Forever, which is running in Vienna until March 19th 2013 (in German). Pictures and other details can be found here.

A Lily, A Rose

My very short book for Barrington Stoke will be released on the 1st of March 2013. It’s called A Lily, A Rose and it’s a sort of love story about a fourteenth-century girl who is horrified when her father tells her she has to marry a man who is nearly fifty. You can find out more about the book, and read the opening chapter, at the Books and Stories section of the website.

Close Your Pretty Eyes

The new Scholastic book is called Close Your Pretty Eyes. It’s a psychological ghost story with a ghost based on a real woman; Victorian murderer Amelia Dyer, who is believed to have killed around four hundred people in her thirty-year career. Close Your Pretty Eyes will be released in August 2013, but you can find out more about it at the Books and Stories section of this website.

All Fall Down

Thanks to everyone who’s bought and reviewed All Fall Down - it’s been so great to hear from readers who’ve enjoyed it. The paperback edition will be coming out in April 2013. All Fall Down has been doing well; and it’s been shortlisted and longlisted for a number of awards. Hurrah!

Shortlisted

Dudley Teen Book Award

Northern Ireland Book Award

Calderdale Book of the Year

Independent Booksellers Week Book Award

Yorkshire Coast Book Award

Coventry Inspiration Book Award

West Australian New Readers’ Book Award

Longlisted

UKLA Book Award

Carnegie Medal

If you live in America, however, then I’m thrilled to announce that the film has been bought by World Wide Motion Pictures, and should be in cinemas in early 2013. Hurrah! I hope you’ll be able to wait that long.

All Fall Down is out and seems to be doing nicely. I’ve also bought a house, which is very exciting - I’ve been busy painting walls, sanding floors and planting things, as well as working on the next two books.

My very short book for Barrington Stoke is finished - it’s called A Lily, A Rose and it’s another historical novel, set about twenty years before All Fall Down. It’s about a fourteen-year-old girl who is told one day that she has to marry a man in his forties, and what she decides to do about it. It should be out in spring 2013.

I also have a short story in the anthology, Next, edited by Keith Gray. Next is a collection of stories for teenagers about the afterlife. There are some big names in there, including Keith Gray, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Malorie Blackman, Jonathan Stroud, so it’s worth reading in its own right. You can read some more about my story on the Books and Stories section of the website.

This week is Independent Booksellers Week - hurrah! - and All Fall Down is shortlisted for the Independent Booksellers Week Award. You can vote for me, or for any of the other authors, in any participating independent bookshop. Do try and support local booksellers this week, and always. A thriving bookshop opens doors and changes lives, and without our support they will die.

I’m going to be appearing in several festivals this year. I’ll be at the Edinburgh Book Festival with Katheryn Erskine on the 25th of August (and in a school’s event with Keith Gray and Kate Harrison on the 24th August), the Cheltenham Literary Festival with Marie-Louise Jensen and Mary Hooper on 7th October and the Northern Children’s Book Festival in Stockton on 24th November. I hope to see some of you in the audience.

Phew! And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d better get on with writing the next book …

Sally

After three long years (and if they’ve felt long to you, they’ve felt even longer to me), ‘All Fall Down’ is released into the world.

The official release date is World Book Day (which is next Thursday), but copies have been sighted in bookshops, it’s available to buy on Amazon, and I know one or two of you at least have already got your hands on a copy. My mother’s read it (and liked it). It’s here.

All three of my novels are also being released as e-books on March 1st. I’m intrigued to see what happens with the e-book editions. Do teenagers buy e-books? (Do teenagers buy books at all? I read voraciously as a teenager, but I rarely bought books. I just forced my local library to order the complete works of Terry Pratchett and Anne McCaffrey in for me. Which they did. Go libraries!)

Also here are the new covers for ‘Ways to Live Forever’ and ‘Season of Secrets’.

I feel a bit sorry for my publishers. They really like the idea of giving all my books matching covers, and I keep confusing them by writing completely different books each time.

The book I’m writing at the moment is different again. Sorry, guys.

One of the nice things about having a book out is that you get invited to all sorts of interesting events. I’m going to be speaking at the Oxford Literary Festival on March 24th, alongside Patrick Ness, Tim Bowler and Moira Young. I’m also going to be doing two events at the Edinburgh Book Festival - a public talk on ‘All Fall Down’ and a schools event on ‘Next?’ an anthology about the afterlife which is coming out in June, and in which I have a story. Keep an eye on the Events page for dates.

This March, I’m a guest editor at www.lovereading4kids.co.uk. I’ll be talking about some of my favourite books for young people (something I get asked about a lot). Please note that I’m only guest editor for March, so you won’t be able to read my selection until March, and after that you’ll have to hunt for me amongst the past editors.

If you live in America, you’ll be pleased to hear that the Ways to Live Forever film has found an American distributor. Hurray! This means it should be showing in American cinemas - I’ll let you know when I have an American release date.

Some of you may also have noticed that I now have a mailing list. You won’t be bombarded with emails if you sign up. (Cue amused ‘huh’s from people who’ve noticed how often I update this website.) But I will try and put some EXCLUSIVE CONTENT in the emails as an incentive to sign up.

Happy World Book for Thursday. Why not celebrate by going into a bookshop and buying yourself a book?

Sally

All Fall Down will be in shops on March 1st 2012. You can pre-order copies here and here. I hope you all like it.

It is a wonderful thing to be finished, not least because it means I can start proper work on the New Book. (I love New Books. They are so full of promise and hope, and nothing too major has gone wrong with them yet.) This New Book is about a girl called Olivia Brown, who I have been spending all day today getting to know. She likes James Bond, and chocolate éclairs, and Batman, and she’s not afraid to punch you in the nose if she needs to. She’s just moved into a new house, and she thinks it might be haunted …

My working title is The Winter Garden, but it will probably change. They usually do. Like all my books, it’s really about family and loss, and young people trying to work out who they are.

My other exciting news is that as well as my usual books for Scholastic, I’ve been contracted to write two novels for the very wonderful people at Barrington Stoke. Barrington Stoke specialise in short, plotty novels by well-known authors. I love the idea of writing a book the length of a long-ish short story, and also of working with this fantastic company. The first book should be out in 2013, but watch this space.

I’m pretty happy about writing at the moment. I’m feeling positive about my new projects, and very happy (if slightly nervous) about having a new book out in 2012. I’m hoping to do a lot of school and bookshop visits in March and April to promote All Fall Down, so if you’re interested in having me visit, do send me an email.

And happy Hallowe’en. Keep a look out for Holly King and the Wild Hunt, if you’re out tonight.

Sally

Well, I’d better have some good news for you since it’s taken me so long to post anything. My first set of good news is that the medieval book will be out in March! Which really isn’t very long. Especially since I haven’t quite finished it yet …

It also has a new title - ‘All Fall Down’, and a cover:

All Fall Down front cover

Isn’t that gorgeous? I can’t wait to see the finished version. It will be a trade paperback (large format, like the purple and green ‘Ways to Live Forever’ and ‘Season of Secrets’), with endpapers, flaps, and textured cardboard finish. Very exciting!

If that wasn’t exciting enough for you, ‘Ways to Live Forever’ and ‘Season of Secrets’ are also getting rebranded, with new covers to match the new Sally Nicholls look. ‘Ways to Live Forever’ will be blue

Ways to Live Forever front cover

And ‘Season of Secrets’ will be red

Season of Secrets front cover

I think the new ‘All Fall Down’ is still my favourite though …

A lot of people have asked about the film - is it coming out, when will it be in cinemas, can I get hold of a copy somehow? The filmmakers are still hoping for a UK cinema release, but have promised that if it doesn’t happen, the film will be made available to fans - either in DVD format or on the internet. I’ll let you know when I know.

As for me … I’m still here, still writing, still messing about on the internet. I’m planning on staying in Oxford for at least the next three years, which is great, something I’m really happy about. I’ve started work on the next book, which is also really exciting - something different again, although like all my books, it’s also about family, friendship and growing up in a world that sometimes seems out to get you. I haven’t killed anyone yet, though.

Oh, and I’m also on Twitter. You can follow me @Sally_Nicholls. Look forward to seeing some of you there!

I hope you all having a lovely summer. I’ve had a great week in Wales, walking coastal paths, swimming in the at-times icy sea and feeling happy to live in such a beautiful nation.

Take care,

Sally

The medieval book has been given the green light by Scholastic - hurrah! - and has a provisional title (A WInd From the South) and a provisional release date of some time at the beginning of 2012 (I know, I know, but things always take forever in publishing). I read through it again a few weeks ago, and was horrified at how much work needs doing to it. So that’s what I’m doing at the moment, taking a lot of little scenes and trying to turn them into a book that works.

My American publishers recently sent me a very beautiful hardback edition of ‘Season of Secrets’

Which looks something like this. It’s coming out in America on the 1st of January.

Also coming out on January 1st is the American paperback of ‘Ways to Live Forever’. In Britain, where most children’s books are paperbacks, this feels like a very long time to wait, but I hope you’re all looking forward to it and haven’t minded it taking so long.

And most excitingly of all, after months of me banging on about it, here’s a chance to see a trailer for the ‘Ways to Live Forever’ film:

http://www.trulymovingpictures.org/movies/ways-to-live-forever/

Doesn’t it look rather wonderful? I hope it all isn’t too different from how you imagined. I’ll let you know as soon as I have a release date.

Yours,

Sally

(Who is enjoying living by a canal in Oxford, with ducks and canal boats and yellow autumn leaves)

Our wedding was rather relaxed - we had a Quaker wedding in a little seventeenth-century meeting house in Yorkshire, followed by a barbeque in a field with a keg of real ale, a band and a bonfire. Molly would have greatly approved. (Sam would have liked the fire-eater and the marshmallows, but probably found the rest of it a bit dull).

The ‘Ways to Live Forever’ showing, however, was anything but relaxed. I’d seen a few scenes from the film already, and was a little freaked out by how much they looked like the inside of my head - a little like hearing someone read your work out loud, or act out scenes from your diary. I was thoroughly expecting to watch the film in an agony of embarrassment, curling my toes and muttering “Oh God, did I write that?” and various other authorly agonies.

Fortunately for my peace of mind, the film - while sticking very closely to the plot of the book - was different enough that I didn’t know what was coming next and could watch it as an audience member and not an author. Of course, it was still a very odd experience. It’s been three years since I read the book all the way through, and I’d forgotten how personal a story it is - how much of it comes from stories my mum used to tell me, or things my brother and I used to do, or dreams and ambitions my friends and I had. ‘Ways to Live Forever’ is a fictional story but it has a lot of my childhood in there too, and it was a little surreal to see that projected onto a cinema screen in the BFI.

Another thing that was odd was the film’s colour scheme. When I wrote ‘Ways to Live Forever’, I wanted it to be a sturdy book. I was aware that it would be all too easy to end up with a pale, wistful, faux-poetic story about butterflies and flowers and white-faced children in hospital wards, and I knew that wasn’t the book I wanted to write. I wanted it to be about real children living in the real world - watching real films and playing video games and painting Warhammer models. Sam and Felix and Ella all had deliberately solid-sounding names for that reason. And although I never mentioned this to the film-makers, they’d obviously picked up on it because the colour scheme for the film is all bright, primary colours. Even Sam’s bedroom View this Posthas a very sturdy feel to it - just like I’d imagined.

The film is coming out on the 29th of October in Spain. It has a website here, where you can see the Spanish trailer and some photographs from the film. I still don’t know when it’s coming out in Britain, but probably not until the new year. Keep coming back here for more news.

Tom and I are now based in Oxford, at least for this year. ‘Season of Secret’ is all set to be published in America in January, and you can already pre-order it on Amazon.

I’ve finished a first draft of the medieval book, and am waiting to see what my editor thinks of it. It doesn’t yet have a title, home or release date yet, so do hold it in your thoughts.

For those of you who haven’t found me on Facebook yet, I’m still here. Snippets you get if you follow me include pictures of all the foreign covers, and a very early first chapter of ‘Season of Secrets’. If I get 500 people liking me, I’ve promised to put up early versions of ‘Ways to Live Forever’, so do follow me if you’re studying or reading the books.

Love as always,

Sally

Some good news is that ‘Ways to Live Forever’ won the Salford Book Award - thank you very much, Salford. The prize was a Lowry print, which made me very happy as my mum grew up in Rochdale, so I know all about Lowry. We used to have one of his pictures over the mantelpiece when I was growing up.

Other exciting news is that I now have a Facebook page. Facebook pages are an excellent way to talk to authors (and stalk them). I’m hoping to update this one a bit more regularly than I manage to update the website, so if you want all the latest news, please do become a fan. There are some pictures of foreign covers and links to interviews and other good things on there already. If you aren’t old enough to go on Facebook, get your mum or dad (or both) to fan it, then you can keep up with what I’m doing through them.

All the best,

Sally

Happy 2010! It looks like 2010 is going to be a good year - I hope this bag of news gets you as excited about it as I am.

First exciting news is that the mass market edition of Season of Secrets is now out - hurrah! Not only is it cheaper than the trade paperback (and will look very pretty on your bookshelf next to the photographic ‘Ways to Live Forever’), but it has a very nice quote on the front from none other than Jacqueline Wilson saying how much she liked it, which is a little surreal for me, as I grew up reading Jacqueline Wilson. Jacqueline liked ‘Season of Secrets’ so much that she sent me fan mail telling me how good it was, which was bizarre and exciting and utterly wonderful. It has also been shortlisted for the Manchester Book Award, and longlisted for the Stockport Book Award and the UKLA Award. It’s on 3-for-2 in Waterstones at the moment, so do check it out, if you haven’t yet.

If you’re looking for news about the ‘Ways to Live Forever’ film, don’t look here, look here. Filming has now finished, and they’re onto the cutting and sticking and twiddling phase of procedings, but there are loads of pictures of the film up to oogle at (like this one of Sam and Felix) and little videos of the actor playing Felix having his head shaved and the director saying how much he liked the book and other fun stuff to waste an afternoon over. Do go and check it out. It is very, very, very wonderful.

Ways to Live Forever also won the 2009 Stockport Book Award - hurrah! Stockport students had a wonderful time making some impressive artwork based on the book and on Sam’s list of things to do - I’m hoping to get that up on the website soon.

I’ve also started work on another book three. Don’t want to say too much about it yet, except it’s going to be a bit historical (okay, very historical, it’s set in 1349, and I’ve already killed seven major characters). I’ll keep you posted on it!

Hope this year brings you all good things - lots of books to read, places to travel to, friends to make and new things to discover.

Hugs,

Sally

Robbie Kay as Sam, in Sam's bedroom.

Okay, exciting news first. There’s going to be a film of ‘Ways to Live Forever’!

It’s being shot at the moment in Newcastle - I went to visit the set yesterday, and it is scarily (excitingly) real and film-set-ish. They have built the whole ground floor of Sam’s house in a warehouse in Newcastle, with fake trees outside, and a wonderful Sam’s bedroom. There are fifty people working there every day, all with very Hollywood-ish titles like Wardrobe Mistress and Assistant Producer and Sound Man. They’ve even got those people who clap clapper boards and say things like ‘Take One!’ and a chair with DIRECTOR written on it. I also saw some of the early rushes and it looks suspiciously like a real film, and very beautiful. Sam is being played by Robbie Kay, and other actors include Emilia Fox, Ben Chaplain, Natalie Tena (Tonks from Harry Potter) and Alex Etal, who’s playing Felix.

You can follow the film on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Madrid-Spain/Ways-to-live-forever/169503934077?ref=mf&v=wall

although some of the posts are in Spanish - this is because Gustavo Ron, the director, is Spanish (but don’t worry, the film is going to be in English too).

They are hoping to have it ready in time to take to the Cannes film festival in May, which is apparently very quick in the film business, and go on general release some time after that.

I will keep you posted of more news as I hear it.

Thanks to everyone who suggested names for the cat in ‘Tell Me The Truth About Love’ - some great ideas there. I’m afraid the sad news is that Scholastic have decided that they don’t want to publish this book at this time, so you’ll have to wait a while for a book with a cat in it. However, I’m putting together some ideas for a new book as we speak, so if they say they’d like to publish that book, I will definitely add a cat somewhere.

Until I know what’s happening with the new idea, though, THE CAT COMPETITION IS CLOSED. So no new entries please.

Thanks for checking the website and I’ll put some more news up as I hear it.

Yours,
Sally