ZANIB MIAN WINS 2018 LITTLE REBELS CHILDREN’S BOOK AWARD

• PDF
• Printer-friendly version
• Send to friend

The Alliance of Radical Booksellers (ARB) has announced that the winner of this year’s Little Rebels Children’s Book Award for Radical Fiction is Zanib Mian for her book, The Muslims, (Sweet Apple Books).

The Muslims is a comic-style-illustrated chapter book which explores the life of Londoner, Omar, as he navigates a new school which comes complete with its resident bully. Keen to apply Islamic teachings to the challenges he faces and armed with a lively imagination, Omar’s journey is a hilarious take on life as a 9-year-old child with a proud Muslim identity in contemporary Britain.

Praising the winning title, judge Patrice Lawrence said, ‘This is a very funny and very effective challenge to the widespread misrepresentation of Muslims in the news. More children need to get to read this book’. Judge Darren Chetty added, ‘Full of humour and eccentricity The Muslims finds a way to explore racism and Islamophobia without allowing the characters to be defined by these things’.

The Muslims is published by Sweet Apple Books, a small independent children’s book publisher set up in 2014, founded on the belief that ‘all children deserve to see themselves in fun stories which are a reflection of their personalities and of their amusing antics and quirks’. Zanib Mian is founder of the company, as well as being a Molecular Cell Biologist, and says she wrote The Muslims in response to the rise in faith-based bullying as reported by Child Line and the NSPCC.

The winner of the Little Rebels Children’s Book Award 2018 was announced by judge and author, Catherine Johnson, at the sixth London Radical Bookfair, organised by the Alliance of Radical Booksellers and held at Goldsmiths University. This followed on from a panel discussion, chaired by judge and author, Patrice Lawrence, with some of the shortlisted authors including Zanib Mian, Jessica Spanyol for Clive Is A Nurse (Child’s Play), Sita Brahmachari for Tender Earth (MacMillan Children’s Books), Elizabeth Laird for Welcome to Nowhere (MacMillan Children’s Books) and Gill Lewis for Sky Dancer (OUP). The three other shortlisted titles were Elys Dolan’s Mr Bunny’s Chocolate Factory (OUP), Kim Slater’s 928 Miles From Home (MacMillan Children’s Books) and Malala Yousafzai and Kerascoët’s Malala’s Magic Pencil (Puffin).

Author Gill Lewis was also given special commendation by Letterbox Library and Housmans Bookshop (who co-run the award) for her ‘Lifetime Achievement as a Big Rebel’. Lewis’ work has been shortlisted for four of the six years the Little Rebels Award has been running, and she won the award in 2015 with Scarlet Ibis. Fen Coles (Letterbox Library) and Catherine Barter (Housmans Bookshop) said, ‘Gill Lewis is an author who has consistently brought complex political issues to her young readers with a compassionate and respectful voice which honours children’s capacity to fight social injustices and bring about change. And all within beautifully written, engaging storylines.’

Read an interview with Little Rebels judge Darren Chetty.