Onjali Q. Raúf
Onjali Q Raúf (born February 1981[1]) is a best-selling English author and the founder of the NGO Making Herstory,[2] a woman's rights organisation tackling the abuse and trafficking of women and girls in the UK and beyond.
![](../I/Onjali_Ra%C3%BAf_at_the_Emirates_Airline_Festival_of_Literature.jpg.webp)
Background
Raúf is of Bangladeshi heritage. Her work is informed in part by her experiences of racism in childhood. "When I started being called Paki, I started to feel [my difference]. I wondered: why is there no one who looks like me in the books? So I wanted to write those characters,” she said in a 2019 interview with The Guardian.[3]
Career
Raúf's début children's novel published by Orion Children's Books, The Boy at the Back of the Class,[4] draws on her own experience delivering emergency aid convoys for refugee families surviving in Calais and Dunkirk.[5] Inspired by a Syrian mother and baby she encountered in a Calais refugee camp, it portrays the refugee crisis through the eyes of a child.[6] It was a Sunday Times Bestseller, winner of the 2019 Blue Peter Book Award for Best Story,[7][8] overall winner of the 2019 Waterstones Children's Book Prize,[9][10] and nominated for the Carnegie Medal Children's Book Award.[11] In the same year she was also shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize for Book of the Year by a Writer of Colour[12] and for breakthrough author in the BAMB (Books Are My Bag) Readers' Awards.[13]
Her second book The Star Outside My Window covered hope and resilience in the face of domestic violence through the innocent eyes of 10-year-old girl.[14] This was shortlisted for the inaugural Diverse Book Awards,[15] and 2020 British Book Awards: Books of the Year.[16] It also made the longlist of the UK Literacy Association Book awards.[17] On top of writing in publications such as The Guardian,[18] she is also a contributor to the BBC Radio 2 program Pause For Thought.[19]
Raúf was named as one of the BBC 100 Women, a list and multi-format series of 100 inspiring and influential women from around the world, for 2019.[20] In December 2019 she talked about "Why children are our most powerful hope for change" at TEDxLondonWomen[21] TEDx event.
List of works
- The Boy at the Back of the Class (2019)
- The Star Outside My Window (2019)
- The Day We Met the Queen (2020)
- The Night Bus Hero (2020)
Awards
- 2019 Blue Peter Book Award, Best Story: The Boy at the Back of the Class[7]
- 2019 Waterstones Children's Book Prize, Younger Fiction and Overall Winner: The Boy at the Back of the Class[9]
References
- "Onjali Qatara RAUF - Personal Appointments". Companies House. Retrieved 2020-01-29.
- "Our Team | Making Herstory". makingherstory.org.uk. Retrieved 2019-03-12.
- Khan, Coco (2019-05-01). "Onjali Rauf: 'My mother said publishing was a white world, but I should always try'". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2020-06-29.
- Raúf, Onjali Q. (2018-07-10). The Boy at the Back of the Class. Curnick, Pippa. London, England. ISBN 9781510105010. OCLC 1013483296.
- "Helping nine-year-olds understand refugees". BBC News. Retrieved 2019-03-18.
- Onjali Q. Rauf - The Boy At the Back of the Class - Hachette Children's Group.
- "The Blue Peter Book Awards celebrate the best authors, most creative illustrators and the greatest reads for children". www.booktrust.org.uk. Retrieved 2019-03-12.
- "Blue Peter Book Awards 2019". www.booktrust.org.uk. Retrieved 2020-10-01.
- "Waterstones Children's Book Prize". www.waterstones.com. Retrieved 2019-03-12.
- Flood, Alison (2019-03-22). "Gripping refugee tale wins Waterstones children's book prize". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2019-03-25.
- "The CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Awards". www.carnegiegreenaway.org.uk. Retrieved 2019-03-12.
- "Indies dominate Jhalak Prize shortlist | The Bookseller". www.thebookseller.com. Retrieved 2019-10-27.
- "Obama, Porter and Thunberg shortlisted for BAMB reader awards | The Bookseller". www.thebookseller.com. Retrieved 2019-10-05.
- Raúf, Onjali Q. (2019). The star outside my window. London: Orion Children's Books. ISBN 978-1-5101-0515-7. OCLC 1126253200.
- "Carty-Williams, Shukla and Malik shorylisted for first Diverse Book Awards | The Bookseller". www.thebookseller.com. Retrieved 2020-10-06.
- "British Book Awards 2020: Books of the Year shortlists revealed | The Bookseller". www.thebookseller.com. Retrieved 2020-10-06.
- "UKLA Book Awards 2021 Longlists". UKLA. Retrieved 2020-10-06.
- "Onjali Rauf | The Guardian". the Guardian. Retrieved 2019-03-26.
- "BBC Radio 2 - Pause For Thought, Vanessa's Pause For Thought: Onjali Rauf on Courage". BBC. Retrieved 2019-03-18.
- "BBC 100 Women 2019: Who is on the list?". 2019-10-16. Retrieved 2019-10-21.
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3wgHkfMorM. Missing or empty
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