By Monica Zak & Gunna Grähs
Beva is in love! The object of her love is Oskar. One day she puts a drawing in his drawer. Beva’s mother has taught her to knit. During a break when she sits and knits, Oskar comes up and says: “How nice. Can’t you teach me?”. A few days later, a package appears in Beva’s mailbox. Inside is a red scarf and a note from Oskar!
Monica Zak has met children and young people from all over the world and tells their stories in a captivating way. She believes that the most important and most enjoyable thing in her life is writing about children and young people for children and young people.
Monica was born in Dresden in 1939, her mother from Sweden and her father from Czechoslovakia, the family managed to get out of Germany at the last moment before the borders were closed.
She grew up in Örebro, where she started writing for newspapers as a 16-year-old and graduated. After journalism studies in Stockholm, she worked at Damernas Värld and Aftonbladet. In 1965 she took a leave of absence to sail to Latin America. The first stage was with the sailing ship Amfitrite to the Canary Islands, where she and her husband bought an old sailboat without an engine. With the schooner Fernando they sailed across the Atlantic Ocean. On the island of Tobago, the son Christofer was born, a week later they continued sailing. The sailing was supposed to last a year; they were gone for six. During that time and many other trips around the world, Monica has collected material for articles, books and documentary films.
Gunna Grähs, (born in Filipstad in 1954), educated at Konstfack. She is active as an illustrator, picture book creator, writer and lecturer. Since her debut in 1982 “Jullan vill vara med” (text by Kjell Johansson) she has published around 70 titles – mostly picture books with her own and others’ texts, but also non-fiction books, comics and satire.