Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick
Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick is a children’s writer and illustrator. Her work ranges across all age groups, from the wordless picture book Owl Bat Bat Owl to her YA reimagining of an Irish legend, On Midnight Beach. She began her illustration career doing whatever work she was offered – schoolbooks, greeting cards, love stories in magazines, book covers, teaching, selling paintings on the railings opposite Ireland’s National Gallery – before finally getting a break into children’s illustration when she turned her hand to writing her own stories. Her first three books were published in Ireland. Since 1999 she has worked mainly with UK and American publishers, and her work has been co-editioned in over 20 countries.
Her first novel for children was Timecatcher, published in 2010. Her books have won multiple awards, nominations and shortlistings, and received shout-outs from the Smithsonian Institute and the Eric Carle Museum. She has been Ireland’s nominee for both the Hans Christian Andersen and Astrid Lindgren Awards and has taken part in children’s book events and festivals in Canada, Germany, France and the USA, as well as Ireland and the UK.
Her most recent picture books are I Can Make a Train Noise and Don’t!, and her novels include the Carnegie-shortlisted On Midnight Beach, the Carnegie-longlisted Sisters of the Moon, and The Museum of Lost Umbrellas – the first in a new middle-grade series with Faber & Faber.
Marie-Louise lives in Ireland and runs on coffee and chocolate, with occasional sides of cake.