Cosmic

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Cottrell-Boyce is an advocate for reading aloud and patron of The Reader Organisation. a charity that works through volunteers to bring literature to everyone, through reading aloud in prisons, care homes and other community spaces. [30] Novels [ edit ] Cottrell-Boyce was born in 1959 in Bootle near Liverpool to a Catholic family. He moved to Rainhill, [5] while still at primary school. [ clarification needed] [6] He attended St Bartholomew's Primary School in Rainhill [7] and West Park Grammar School. [5] He was greatly influenced by reading Moomins growing up. [8] Frank Cottrell-Boyce is an accomplished, successful and award-winning author and screenwriter. His books have been shortlisted for a multitude of prizes, including the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, the Whitbread Children's Fiction Award (now the Costa Book Award) and the Roald Dahl Funny Prize and Millions, his debut children's novel, won the CILIP Carnegie Medal 2004. It’s also just a great book about dads and how important they are. Adults reading will understand pretty early on that Florida’s supposedly perfect father that she's always comparing Liam to is just a figment of her imagination. In fact, fathers are sort of the most consistent theme of the book. Early on Liam comes to the conclusion that his dad only speaks on five separate topics of conversation. Then, when he finds himself a kind of pseudo-father, he steals his dad’s book on how to talk to teens, and finds himself in the old man’s shoes. Finally, even when he’s in the most trouble, Liam can’t help but think that his dad may still find him, even in the farthest reaches of space. It’s this childlike faith that keeps reminding you that for all his posturing, Liam’s really just a kid like the rest of them. And when Liam acts like a kid, it always makes sense. He doesn’t do it randomly. He just reacts to situations like a child would want to and the result is sometimes funny, sometimes disastrous. Which in turn makes his sacrifice at the end all the more impressive. I read this book to my year 5 class and they all loved it. It was full of funny situations that Liam had got himself into due to his height that made my class and I laugh out loud. It's written from Liam's point of view which shows the naivety of a young teenager's thought process and how they can get themselves into trouble without even trying. This was especially funny for the boys in the class.

Cosmic KS1 and KS2 teaching resources - BBC Teach Cosmic KS1 and KS2 teaching resources - BBC Teach

Boyce gets Liam’s voice just right. A screenwriter, he knows how to set-up scenes, create engaging dialog, and make a completely improbable situation believable. As he did with Millions, Boyce brings in deep philosophical ideas in a kid-friendly, convincing, and moving way. With this one it is about dads, about what it is to be one, what it is to be an adult. To the book’s readers, Liam is convincingly a kid throughout his story, even as he convinces the adults he encounters that he is an adult. And not just any adult — an adult just like his dad. Frank Cottrell-Boyce [1] (born 23 September 1959) [2] is an English screenwriter, novelist and occasional actor, known for his children's fiction and for his collaborations with film director Michael Winterbottom. He has achieved fame as the writer for the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony and for sequels to Chitty Chitty Bang Bang: The Magical Car, a children's classic by Ian Fleming. [3] a b c Cottrell Boyce, Frank (28 July 2012). "An Interview with Frank Cottrell Boyce". Today (Interview). Interviewed by John Humphrys. I looked down at the pedals. I knew one of them was the accelerator. I just wasn't sure which one. One lesson the World of Warcraft teaches you is that if you want to succeed on the next level, you need to acquire new skills. Don't level up until you've skilled up. Sadly this was a lesson I'd forgotten. I was pretty sure though that the accelerator was the one in the middle. I had my foot on it when the door on the passenger side opened and a very familiar voice said, 'You. Out. Now. Come on.'" He met Denise Cottrell, a fellow Keble undergraduate, and they married in Keble College chapel. Together they have seven children. [9] He is also a patron of the Insight Film Festival, [10] a biennial, interfaith festival held in Manchester, UK, to make positive contributions to understanding, respect and community cohesion. [11]

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Liam Digby is only 12 but he is VERY tall. He is so tall that people actually think he is an adult (the fact that he has Premature Facial Hair also helps). For most part, Liam enjoys the benefits and advantages of being regarded as an adult: he goes to places he is not supposed to; he gets to drive a Porsche; and after passing the height restrictions, enjoys the scariest rollercoaster ever: the Cosmic. On the downside, being too tall and adult-like somehow creates unreasonable expectations and it’s not unusual for Liam to hear the words: “a big guy like you, you should know better” . This was a strange book, the main character is a 12 yo boy who is very tall, has some facial hair and often gets confused as an adult. The characters are from a small town called Bootle in England, which is somewhere near Liverpool I believe. So I needed to watch a bit of Red Dwarf to practice my Liverpudlian accent before we started. The young lad enters a competition with Drax World, a mobile phone company building a theme park in China. He pretends to be the Dad of one of his class mates, a girl who he has a typical 12 yo relationship with. Said relationship becomes confused when they realise that acting as her dad allows them to go and do things normally not allowed for two 12 year olds. On winning the prize Frank Cottrell-Boyce said: “It would be amazing to win this award with any book I'd written but it is a special joy to win it with The Unforgotten Coat, which started life not as a published book at all, but as a gift. Walker gave away thousands of copies in Liverpool - on buses, at ferry terminals, through schools, prisons and hospitals - to help promote the mighty Reader Organisation. We even had the book launch on a train. The photographs in the book, were created by my friends and neighbours - Carl Hunter and Claire Heaney. The story was based on a real incident in a school in Bootle. So everything about it comes from very close to home - even though it's a story about Xanadu!

Cosmic by Frank Cottrell-Boyce (9781529008777/Paperback

You can find out a bit more about him and his Chitty Chitty Bang Bang triology at uk.chittyfliesagain.com Well as an elementary school librarian children's literature is my business (and fortunately for me also my passion). My husband is a big gamer and I play with him. So I guess I qualify as that rare (possibly statistically non-existent) double nerd who both reads children's books and plays an online game.

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More than that, Cosmic is also a muse on what it means to be a grown-up, as well as a dad, so I can easily see why industry magazines are showering it with stars. While I think it's authentically written in the voice of a 12-year-old boy, I'm neither twelve nor a boy, so I'd be interested in what middle school kids think of this book too. There are a number of elements that Frank Cottrell Boyce deftly combines to make COSMIC one of the funniest books I've read this year: I think Cosmic would be enjoyed by just about everyone in the world and in the words of Gob Bluth: “What you need to know… [dramatic pause] Is that it’s magic” or more to point: it is totally cosmic. Read it. So I turned the key in the ignition. The car made a sound like a cat purring. The man stepped aside and pointed to the bonnet. 'Engineering perfection.' He smiled."It is at the moment, I thought. But in five minutes' time it might well be a load of scrap metal. The thing about Level Two of course is that it has new and unexpected dangers. So you stand a much better chance of being killed.

Cosmic - YEAR 5 READING - 6 WEEKS | Teaching Resources Cosmic - YEAR 5 READING - 6 WEEKS | Teaching Resources

Cottrell Boyce has also written Millions, about two kids and an unexpected bag of money, and Framed, about a nine-year-old boy, some great art, and a village filled with eccentrics.

Craig, Amanda (6 June 2008). "Screenwriter Frank Cottrell-Boyce's new children's book Cosmic is his best yet. Amanda Craig meets him". Times Online. London. Archived from the original on 15 June 2011 . Retrieved 20 May 2010. This book follows the story of a 12-year-old boy, Liam, who is often mistaken for an adult due to his height and facial hair. In the beginning, there is some explanation of the adventures this has led to (and the often disastrous outcomes), as he dwells on the time he had taken a Porsche on a test drive with his ‘daughter’ Florida (who is actually a friend from school). The majority of the book, however, is dedicated to their time in space, orbiting the moon in a shuttle that closely resembles an ice-cream bus. Frank is also a successful writer of film scripts and was the official scriptwriter for the Opening Ceremony for the 2012 Olympics, playing an important role devising the ceremony with Danny Boyle. He is also a judge for the BBC Radio 2 500 Words competition. You can read a great interview with Frank and one of his fellow judge, Francesca Simon here!