New YA novel from Anne Fine for David Fickling

David Fickling Books is publishing a new novel from former Children’s Laureate Anne Fine OBE.

Shades of Scarlet is billed as "a laugh-out-loud, sharply funny look at the complexities of family life, teenage emotions and the power of self-expression," and will publish in hardback on 6th August 2020. DFB acquired world rights in all languages except French.

The synopsis reads: "Scarlet’s parents are splitting up but she only finds out that her mum is seeing Jack Naylor’s uncle Richard when Pedro blurts it out at school. Her dad seems to be taking it lying down, and Scarlet’s world begins to implode around her. What on earth might a girl like Scarlet write in the beautiful blank book she's been given in which to chart her feelings?"

Publisher David Fickling said: "After a lifetime of admiration as an editor, it is an especial thrill for me and David Fickling Books to be publishing the wonderful Anne Fine. She is one of our wisest, funniest, most loved writers. Shades of Scarlet is as readable and enlightening as ever, and I dare say readers young and old will crack a smile of deep recognition too. I did."

Writing over 80 books for children, translated into 45 languages, and known for her comedic writing, Fine was Children’s Laureate from 2001 to 2003, then becoming a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and awarded an OBE. Her most recent novel, Battle of Wills, was published in 2016.

Fine's novel Goggle-Eyes (Puffin) won the Guardian’s Children’s Fiction Prize and she has won the Carnegie Medal twice over, for Goggle-Eyes and Flour Babies (Puffin), the latter also winning the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year. Her novel Madame Doubtfire (Puffin) was adapted into the film starring Robin Williams and will open on Broadway in March 2020.