Matt Haig (born 3 July 1975) is an English author and journalist. He has written both fiction and non-fiction books for children and adults, often in the
speculative fiction genre.
Haig is the author of both fiction and non-fiction for children and adults.[5] His work of non-fiction, Reasons to Stay Alive, was a number one Sunday Times bestseller and was in the UK top 10 for 46 weeks. His bestselling children's novel, Father Christmas and Me, is currently[when?] being adapted for film, produced by
StudioCanal and Blueprint Pictures.[citation needed]
His novels are often dark and quirky takes on family life. The Last Family in England retells
Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 with the protagonists as dogs. His second novel Dead Fathers Club is based on Hamlet, telling the story of an introspective 11-year-old dealing with the recent death of his father and the subsequent appearance of his father's ghost. His third adult novel, The Possession of Mr Cave, deals with an obsessive father desperately trying to keep his teenage daughter safe. His children's novel, Shadow Forest, is a fantasy that begins with the horrific death of the protagonists' parents. It won the
Nestlé Children's Book Prize in 2007.[6] He followed it with the sequel, Runaway Troll, in 2008.[citation needed]
Haig's vampire novel The Radleys was published in 2011.[7] In 2013, he published The Humans. It is the story of an alien who takes the identity of a university lecturer whose work in mathematics
threatens the stability of the planet who must also cope with the home life which accompanies his task.[citation needed]
In 2017, Haig published How to Stop Time, a novel about a man who appears to be 40 but has, in fact, lived for more than 400 years and has met
Shakespeare,
Captain Cook and
F. Scott Fitzgerald. In an interview with The Guardian, Haig revealed the book has been optioned by
StudioCanal films, and
Benedict Cumberbatch had been "lined up to star" in the film adaptation.[8]Reasons to Stay Alive won the
Books Are My Bag Readers' Awards in 2016 and How to Stop Time was nominated in 2017.[9] In August 2018, he wrote lyrics for English singer and songwriter
Andy Burrows's music album, the title of which was derived from Haig's book Reasons to Stay Alive.[10]
In 2020, Matt Haig released his novel The Midnight Library about a young woman named Nora Seed who is unhappy with her choices in life. During the night she tries to kill herself but ends up in a library managed by her school librarian, Mrs. Elm. The library is between life and death with millions of books filled with stories of her life had she made some decisions differently. In this library, she then tries to find the life in which she's the most content.[11] It was shortlisted for the 2021
British Book Awards "Fiction book of the year".[12]The Midnight Library was adapted for radio and broadcast in ten episodes on
BBC Radio 4 in December 2020.[13]
In 2021, Haig appeared on
Storybound, accompanied by an original score from Robert Wynia.[14]
Haig identifies as an
atheist.[16] He has said that books are his one true faith, and the library is his church.[18]
Some of Haig's work — especially part of the non-fiction books — is inspired by the mental breakdown he suffered from when he was 24-years-old.[19] He still occasionally suffers from
anxiety.[20] He has been diagnosed with
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and
autism.[21]
Works
Novels
The Last Family in England (
Jonathan Cape, 2004); US title, The Labrador Pact