The brand new World Book Day App is available now for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch on the iTunes store, the low, low price of absolutely FREE!
It includes six brilliant short stories written especially for World Book Day by some of the best Young Adult authors in the world! Find out about the stories and browse and buy books by their authors:
Callum
Author: Malorie Blackman
Publisher: Random House
In a hostile alternative society, the pale-skinned noughts are treated as inferiors by the ruling dark-skinned Crosses.
Callum’s a nought. Sephy’s a Cross. In their world, they simply don’t fit – it’s as clear as black and white. But their childhood friendship has grown into intense, burning love. They have to find a way to be together.
Then Sephy’s kidnapped, and Callum’s faced with a choice– his love for Sephy or his loyalty to his brother. Once that choice is made, there can be no looking back.
An explosive and passionate short story, set during the timeline of Malorie Blackman’s original dystopian bestseller, Noughts and Crosses.
Malorie Blackman
Malorie Blackman lives in Kent with her husband and daughter. A multi-award- winning author, her work has also been adapted into a BAFTA-award-winning TV serial. In 2008 she was honoured with an OBE for her services to Children’s Literature.
Browse and buy books by Malorie Blackman here.
Orange
Author: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Published especially for World Book Day 2012, this short story by Neil Gaiman is just a little bit different. So there’s no blurb. Just read it.
Neil Gaiman
Neil Gaiman has written highly acclaimed books for children and adults, many of which have been made into films. He’s the first author to have won both the Carnegie and Newbery Medals for the same work – The Graveyard Book. His ground-breaking picture books include The Wolves in the Walls and his graphic novel series Sandman has been hailed as ‘the greatest epic in the history of comic books.’ In 2011, Neil wrote The Doctor’s Wife episode of Doctor Who and appeared as himself in The Simpsons.
Browse and buy books by Neil Gaiman here.
The Enemy: Geeks vs Zombies
Author: Charlie Higson
Publisher: Puffin
In a changed world where adults have become sickos ravaged by disease, everyone under the age of fourteen is fighting to survive.
Chris and his friends are determined to mark World Book Day, but when a fellow survivor turns against them, they’re left defenceless. Can they stop a gruesome attack from their violent enemy, in a deadly battle of geeks vs zombies?
Charlie Higson
Charlie Higson is the author of the phenomenally successful Young Bond series. He also writes screenplays and is a performer and co-creator of The Fast Show, Bellamy’s People and the award-winning Down the Line. Charlie’s a big fan of horror films and hopes to give many young people sleepless nights with this new series.
Browse and buy books by Charlie Higson here.
A Taste of Death
Author: Anthony Horowitz
Publisher: Walker Books
Alex Rider has recently returned from his second mission as a teenage spy for MI6, and life is back to normal. So normal, in fact, that the only reason for missing school is an appointment with the dentist.
But a chance encounter with a familiar face triggers Alex’s suspicions … and it isn’t long until he’s back in action fighting a terrorist conspiracy
Anthony Horowitz
Anthony Horowitz is one of the most popular contemporary children’s writers. Both The Power of Five and Alex Rider are number one bestselling series, enjoyed by millions worldwide. He’s won many major awards, and also writes for TV. His latest novel, The House of Silk is a brand new Sherlock Holmes adventure, written with the endorsement of the Conan Doyle estate.
Browse and buy books by Anthony Horowitz here.
Acting Friends
Author: Sophie McKenzie
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Life at her new school is not going smoothly for River. After inadvertently making an enemy of the troubled Shaz, she hopes at least to have found friendship with classmates Emmi and Grace. However, when it comes to the boy of her dreams, can River count on any of her friends?
Sophie McKenzie
Sophie McKenzie is the multi award-winning author of bestsellers Girl, Missing, Blood Ties, and many more. She’s best-known for her thrillers for teen readers, including the Medusa Project and Blood Ties/Blood Ransom series. She also wrote the Luke & Eve romance trilogy.
Acting Friends sets the scene for a new romance series that begins with Falling Fast.
Browse and buy books by Sophie McKenzie here.
My Soul To Lose
Author: Rachel Vincent
Publisher: Harlequin
Kaylee Cavanaugh’s trip to the mall ends with a brutal panic attack and a brainscrambling shriek she can’t stop. Her secret fear is exposed. It’s the worst day of her life. Until she wakes up in the psychiatric unit.
But the hospital isn’t a safe place for Kaylee, and getting out won’t be easy because everyone thinks she’s crazy. Everyone except Lydia, who has a secret of her own…
Rachel Vincent
A recent transplant into the Deep South of the USA, Rachel Vincent has a BA in English and an overactive imagination, and consistently finds the latter to be more practical. Rachel is older than she looks – seriously – and younger than she feels, but remains convinced that every day she spends writing, one more day will be added to her lifespan.
With her fresh, hip and compelling style, Rachel Vincent’s urban fantasy novels have been causing a buzz on both sides of the Atlantic.
Browse and buy books by Rachel Vincent here.
Exclusive Extracts
Tempest
Author: Julie Cross
Publisher: Macmillan
TODAY
Jackson and Holly are in love.
TOMORROW
she will lie bleeding in his arms.
YESTERDAY
Jackson must undo it all.
Jackson has a secret – he can jump into his own past. But when a shocking event propels him further back in time than he has ever been before, he finds he can’t return.
Now Jackson has to find a way to save the girl he loves before they’ve even met, and time is not on his side…
Julie Cross
Julie Cross lives in Illinois, USA. She works with children and teenagers as a gymnastics programme director and runs teen-writers’ workshops. Most of all she loves reading teen books. So, one day in 2009, she decided she was going to write her own – and Tempest, her passionate and pacy debut novel, was born.
Browse and buy books by Julie Cross here.
Candy Pop
Author: Lauren Laverne
Publisher: Harper Collins
Misunderstood musical genius Candy Caine – age fifteen – knows she’s destined for a bigger life beyond her small-town existence. And now Mum’s marrying The World’s Dullest Man®, it’s time to put plans into action and achieve world domination with her band, The Broken Biscuits. Oh – and find her real dad, who will most definitely be cool…
With a battered old guitar and some supernatural assistance, can Candy get her life on track and her band on the road to greatness?
Lauren Laverne
Uber-cool presenter, Lauren Laverne first came into the spotlight as a singer in the cult indie group Kenickie. She’s presented shows such as CD:UK, The Culture Show, The Brits and Glastonbury and interviewed everyone from U2 and Madonna to Dizzee Rascal and Little Boots. After encouragement from her husband – who said, “you’re an excellent speller” – Lauren began writing again.
Browse and buy books by Lauren Laverne here.
Mortal Chaos
Author: Matt Dickinson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
This heart-stopping, high-action new teen novel is based on chaos theory – the principle that a single occurrence, no matter how small, can start a chain of events which can change the course of the universe forever. From the friends hunting in an English wood to a young climber on Everest, from the pilot of a commercial airline to an American psycho, the chaos knows no bounds.
Take a sneak peek at the first few chapters as the chaos commences…
Matt Dickinson
Matt Dickinson is an award-winning film maker and writer with a passion for wild places and even wilder people. Matt’s worked with some of the world’s top climbers and adventurers, joining them on their expeditions to the Himalayas and beyond, and has survived some life-threatening dramas along the way.
Browse and buy books by Matt Dickinson here.
A Witch In Winter
Author: Ruth Warburton
Publisher: Hachette
When love is tangled up in magic, how can you be sure what’s real?
Anna Winterson doesn’t know she’s a witch and would probably mock you for believing in magic, but after moving to the small town of Winter with her father, she learns more than she ever wanted to about power.
When Anna meets Seth, she’s smitten, but when she enchants him to love her, she unwittingly amplifies a deadly conflict between two witch clans and splits her own heart in two…
Ruth Warburton
Ruth Warburton studied English at the University of Manchester, and there developed a fascination with Old English and Middle English texts such as Beowulf and Le Morte d’Arthur. Seeds from these mixed with Voodoo spells, ancient Mesopotamian demons, Tudor superstitions and 15th century witch-hunting guides, to create the Winter Trilogy.
Browse and buy books by Ruth Warburton here.
