Anna Fienberg

Anna Fienberg was born in England but moved to Australia aged three.

She grew up in a house filled with books. Her mother was a teacher-librarian who relished stories as much as chocolates.”On Sunday mornings we’d all lie in bed with our books, lost in magical wardrobes, witches’ spells, genies’ magic… What we were going to read next was just as important in our family as what was for lunch!” says Anna.

She started writing stories aged eight, but never imagined being an author.

She studied Psychology, fascinated by the dark world of dreams, but gave up counselling (after an unfortunate incident with an enraged man and a chair!)

She began working for School Magazine which she describes as ‘a treat, ‘I couldn’t believe you could get paid for sitting back comfortably in your chair, cappuccino in hand, reading over a thousand books a year. Heaven!’

Of course, as an editor she also had to write reviews, articles, stories, and plays. One story later became her first book, Billy Bear and the Wild Winter. In 1989 she released her first novel, The Nine Lives of Balthazar. She has won the Children’s Book of the Year Award: Younger Readers in 1992 for The Magnificent Nose and Other Marvels and has been a short-listed nominee on four other occasions

She has also won the Alan Marshall Award for Children’s Literature in 1993 for Ariel, Zed & the Secret of Life and the 2003 Aurealis Award for best children’s short fiction for Tashi and the Haunted House. She has also been an Aurealis Award finalist on four other occasions.

She was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2019 in recognition of her “significant service to literature as an author”

She finds many things amusing;”My son makes me laugh, he is a wonderful mimic., also watching people at the lights in their cars when they think no one is looking, my huge slobbery dog Fig who means well but is incredibly clumsy, my father’s dreadful puns, funny books..”