Joseph Coelho is a performance poet, children’s author, and playwright. The Girl Who Became a Tree (Otter-Barry Books), a beautiful story told in poems, is shortlisted for the 2021 CILIP Carnegie Medal.
Fairytales Gone Bad: Zombierella (Walker) is Joseph's first title in a funny and deliciously dark, three-part series of twisted classics and is shortlisted for The Alligator's Mouth Award for illustrated early fiction 2021. Luna Loves Dance (Andersen Press) is the latest title in the Luna Loves... series and will be published in September 2021 and his fantastic non-fiction title How to Write Poems is published by Bloomsbury.
Joseph has written plays for the Polka Theatre, Soho Theatre and the Unicorn Theatre. He tours his own dynamic poetry theatre for young people, and performs with the UK's top performance poetry organisation, Apples and Snakes. Joe has also been a guest poet on Cbeebies’ Rhyme Rocket.
- Winner of the Independent Bookshop Week Award 2019 for If All the World Were... (Frances Lincoln, illustrated by Allison Colpoys)
- Winner of the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education Poetry Award (CLiPPA)
- Sunday Times Children's Book of the Week for Overheard in a Tower Block (Otter-Barry Books)
