Quotes from Malorie Blackman

Part of my job as Children's Laureate is to visit schools and talk about my love of books and stories and encourage them all to do it as well - to read, to write, to never be afraid of their own voice. Because we all have something to say.

I'm one of the few adults lucky enough to love their job. And when you've got bills to pay, you get on with it! I like challenges.

Dear God, please let him have heard me. Please. Please. If you're up there. Somewhere.

I remember being in a history lesson and saying to my teacher, 'How come you never talk about black scientists and inventors and pioneers?' And she looked at me and said, 'Because there aren't any.'

We had a few non-fiction books at home, but my dad was of the opinion that fiction was a complete and utter waste of time because it wasn't real - so what was the point of reading it?

What I want is to try and get across the idea that reading for pleasure is so beneficial. And turn children on who have maybe been switched off reading or never found a love of it in the first place.

Book sales and teens reading is always a fantastic thing, but we should also be celebrating and consuming the huge wealth of U.K. and U.K.-based writing and illustrating talent. Authors such as Charlie Higson, Darren Shan, Holly Smale, Tanya Byrne, Catherine Johnson, Sophie Mckenzie, to name but a few.

I would like to use stories as a springboard for children to make their own creative responses. I would like to encourage them to express themselves using music, art, film or whatever, and upload it to a website having been inspired by particular stories.

Children will go with any story as long as it's good, but white adults sometimes think that if a black child's on the cover, it is perhaps not for them.

I didn't even enter a bookshop until I was 14 because I couldn't afford books until I got my first Saturday job, but by the time I was six or seven, I spent practically every Saturday down my local library reading as much as I could and getting out as many books as I could.

I have encountered those who feel that libraries have served their purpose and are no longer needed. There are those who consider them a soft target when it comes to local authority budget cuts. In certain political quarters, there is a refusal to see that our public library service needs active protection.

Books teach children to see the world through the eyes of others and empathise with others. It's about the story.

So why did you want to kiss me?" "We're friends aren't we?" Callum shrugged. I relaxed into a smile. "Of course we are." "And if you can't kiss your friends who can you kiss?" Callum smiled.

Reading is an exercise in empathy; an exercise in walking in someone else's shoes for a while.

I remember going into a bookshop, and the only book I saw with a black child on the cover was 'A Thief in the Village' by James Berry, and I thought, 'Is this still the state of publishing?' Then I thought, 'Either I can whine about it or try to do something about it.'

Books allow you to see the world through the eyes of others.

I personally, as a teenager, didn't like books I felt were trying to preach to me... I did not believe in happy endings. I wanted to read books which reflected life as I thought I knew it.

There is a saying: 'The child is parent to the adult', which means whatever happens to you as a child or teenager affects the adult you become. You are forged in your history. And fiction is an incredibly important force in shaping children, and that's why fiction needs to be diverse.

Teenagers are some of the most passionate, dynamic and creative people I know. Yet, too often, this creative spark is left to flicker precariously and sometimes fade entirely.

What I wanted to do was use literature and different kinds of stories and poems as a springboard, tapping into the creativity of our teens - I wanted teenagers to come up with their own creative responses to literature - using books themselves as a starting point.

The best thing about being Children's Laureate has definitely been all the children and teens I've met.

I read a lot of highly unsuitable books for an 11-year-old. I was desperate to read as widely as possible. I thought, 'There are so many places I am never going to get the chance to visit, but I can if I read them.' And I did. I could go anywhere in the world - and off it - by reading.

When I was a child, we used to look forward to the end of the day when we would hear another ten minutes of a story.

Five years off my life... I wondered with a wry smile, would people be immortal if they didn't have kids?