Opening Keynote: Frank Cottrell-Boyce

Tuesday 8th July 2025, 6:00pm - 7:15pm BST

Sheffield City Hall

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Shake Things Up with Frank Cottrell-Boyce

Frank Cottrell-Boyce, screenwriter for film and TV, award-winning novelist, and the current Waterstones Children’s Laureate returns to CMC on 8 July to give the Opening Keynote. Frank is the first keynote speaker to return to CMC, having spoken brilliantly in 2013 about his unique role as writer on the London Summer Olympics Opening Ceremony.

We’ve invited Frank in recognition of his unique contribution to the lives of children and young people, his passionate support of the people who make content for them and his razor-sharp observations on creativity, culture, content and the young.  Exactly one year into his Laureateship Frank will reflect on the troubling times we live in and how the children’s media community can step up to the challenges and still shake things up for kids.

Earlier this year, Frank organised the Reading Rights Summit in Liverpool and launched a campaign to persuade the government to recognise the joy of reading for pleasure and the benefits that access to books can bring to children and their families.

He is the author of ‘Sputnik’s Guide to Life on Earth’, ‘The Astounding Broccoli Boy’, ‘Cosmic’, ‘Framed’, and ‘Millions’, the last of which was a New York Times bestseller and was made into a movie by Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle.

His books have won or been nominated for numerous awards, including the Carnegie Medal, the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, and the Whitbread Children’s Book Award. Frank is also a screenwriter, having penned the scripts for a number of feature films including ’24 Hour Party People’ and ‘Millions’ as well as the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics. He lives in Liverpool with his family.