VIEWERS of BBC children?s programme Blue Peter have chosen a book by West Devon author Michael Morpurgo as their favourite of the year. The former Children?s Laureate has been named as the 2005 Blue Peter Book Award winner for his book Private Peaceful, which is set in the First World War. The book also triumphed in the ?Book I Couldn?t Put Down? category. The prestigious awards are judged by a specially selected panel of children. Mr Morpurgo from Iddesleigh, said: ?To win a prize is always encouraging to a writer. To win a prize judged by your readers is something very special indeed.? Private Peaceful is a children?s book set in the First World War which describes the last hours of boy soldier Private Thomas Peaceful, who narrates the story. In the book, Thomas movingly looks back over his short life as he anticipates a firing squad at dawn, recalling a joyful childhood in Iddesleigh and how he has come to be on the front line. Mr Morpurgo was moved to write Private Peaceful following his shock at discovering how many young soldiers were court-martialled and shot for cowardice during the First World War. He said: ?I happened to interview three farm boy veterans, then well into their eighties, when I was researching my book War Horse. They told me something of what they had lived through. ?There was no poetry in their stories, only horror and regret and great sadness for the loss of good friends, so I came to write Private Peaceful.? To date the book has already sold over 150,000 copies in the UK and also won The Red House Children?s Book Awards in 2004. It was also shortlisted for the Whitbread Children?s Book Award and the Carnegie Medal. His latest title The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips continues the war theme, focusing on the evacuation of several South Coast villages in early 1944 to make way for American troops as they practise for the imminent D-Day landings. Michael Morpurgo is the author of over sixty books and was the Children?s Laureate from 2003 to 2005.
