Malorie Blackman faces racist abuse after call to diversify children's books | Books | The Guardian

Support for Blackman, the UK's first black children's laureate, was immediate from both her fellow writers and from her readers. Carnegie medal winner Patrick Ness tweeted: "I adore @malorieblackman. I think she's a brilliant Laureate. I'm seething. Why have we agreed we're OK with this? I'm bloody well not." The novelist Matt Haig announced he was "disgusted that the wonderful @malorieblackman, one of the great forces for good, has had to come off Twitter because of racist abuse". Chocolat author Joanne Harris told Blackman: "Don't read below the idiot-line. You are loved and appreciated here ", and Horrid Henry author Francesca Simon added: "I'm proud to be a children's writer with the marvellous @malorieblackman representing us."