Valerie Bloom wins CLiPPA 2022

Valerie Bloom is the winner of the 2022 CLiPPA (CLPE Children’s Poetry Award), the UK's only award for published poetry for children.

Bloom won for her collection Stars with Flaming Tails, illustrated by Ken Wilson-Max (Otter-Barry Books), a beautifully varied collection with poems on family, friends and animals, and Valerie approaches each poem with rare empathy and, typically, much lively humour.

Valerie draws on her Caribbean background in her poetry and believes that poetry helps us make sense of our world. She describes her poems as 'mirrors and windows', enabling children both to see themselves reflected and to look into others' lives.

She has numerous examples of the impact her poetry has on young people. For example, she tells of meeting a young woman, also of Jamaican heritage, who thanked her for helping her to pass her English GCSE; Valerie's poem, written in Jamaican, made complete sense to her and spoke directly to her, unlike any of the others on the syllabus.

Though Valerie has written and edited several volumes of poetry for children and adults, receiving an MBE for services to poetry in 2008, this is the first time she has won the CLiPPA.

CLiPPA Shortlist 2022

Stars with Flaming Tails by Valerie Bloom, illustrated by Ken Wilson-Max, Otter-Barry Books.
The judges called this a lively demonstration of how children's poetry can move from the personal to the planetary, the surreal to the scientific, laugh-out-loud to stop-and-think, in a breath.

Being Me: Poems about Thoughts, Worries and Feelings by Liz Brownlee, Matt Goodfellow and Laura Mucha, illustrated by Victoria Jane Wheeler, Otter-Barry Books.
The judges said: Being Me weaves three distinctive writing voices with a deft and witty illustrator's eye to give young readers words and images to help them map all angles of their inner lives.  

Caterpillar Cake by Matt Goodfellow, illustrated by Krina Patel-Sage, Otter-Barry Books.
The judges said: Caterpillar Cake shows that we can bring subtlety and scope to the youngest reading ages by the power of reading aloud, not just hearing but feeling the words on your tongue.

The Crossing by Manjeet Mann, Penguin.
The judges said: The Crossing combines the narrative reach of a novel and the line by-line impact of poetry to tell the most urgently contemporary of stories in personal voices we cannot ignore.

Cloud Soup by Kate Wakeling, illustrated by Elina Brasliņa, The Emma Press.
The judges said: Cloud Soup whirls its readers deep into the play of the imagination so effortlessly that we barely notice how much we are learning about the craft, the thrilling possibilities, of poetry.