BOOKS TO GET HOOKED ON

Paul Jennings´Funniest Stories is a collection of short stories where the universe of children and teenagers makes up enjoyable plots that appeal to young and old readers. Adolescents who blindly rely on magic lipsticks to capture girls´ attention, teenagers that take their revenge on obsessive parents… Jennings´ mastery of simplicity and vocabulary are crucial to the success of his hilarious stories.

Paul Jennings

About Paul Jennings

by Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers

Paul Jennings was born in England in 1943. He emigrated to Australia when he was six and grew up in suburban Moorabbin in Victoria.

After leaving university, Paul worked as a teacher of disabled and socially deprived children for six years and then as a speech pathologist for four years. Following this he became a lecturer in special education and then Senior Lecturer in Language and Literature at the Warrnambool Institute of Advanced Education.

In 1989 he moved, with his second wife Claire and family to Melbourne and became a full-time writer. His writing has a distinctive style. It is fast moving, highly improbable, humorous and strongly plotted, and has very modern characters.

Paul Jennings

Paul had wanted to write since childhood as a result of happy escapism into the world of books. However, after the rejection of one of his stories which he submitted to Women's Weekly at the age of 16, Paul shelved his ambitions until his late thirties, when his first book Unreal! was published in Australia in 1985. Since then, Jennings has not looked back and has published a novel, The Gizmo, and several other collections of short stories such as Uncovered!, Unbelievable! and Quirky Tails on which the Australian TV series, "Round the Twist," is based.

Paul Jennings is particularly concerned with making reading interesting and fun for children instead of a chore. Apart from writing, Jennings spends a considerable amount of time and energy visiting schools and speaking at conferences and seminars, particularly on the subject of encouraging children to read. Paul Jennings is Australia's biggest-selling author, having sold 2.35 million books across 19 titles in Australia alone. In 1992 he received the Golden Puffin Award for being one of Australia's largest-selling authors.

"Many people ask me, 'What's it like to be a writer, Paul Jennings?' Well, it's a great life. I don't think I would want to do anything else. I get an enormous amount of mail from all over the world. I always think how lucky I am that people like my stories so much that they take the time to let me know. That's really great”.