Laura Steven (also known as Laura Salters, L. K. Steven, or Laura Kirkpatrick) is an English novelist. She won the inaugural Comedy Women in Print Prize for her novel ''The Exact Opposite of Okay'' (2018). She has used comedy to explore feminist issues in her

young adult novels Young adult literature (YA) is typically written for readers aged 12 to 18 and includes most of the themes found in adult fiction, such as family dysfunction, substance abuse, alcoholism, and sexuality. It is characterized by simpler world build ...

, including an exploration of beauty in ''Every Exquisite Thing'' (her re-telling of ''

The Picture of Dorian Gray ''The Picture of Dorian Gray'' is an 1890 philosophical fiction and Gothic fiction, Gothic horror fiction, horror novel by Irish writer Oscar Wilde. A shorter novella-length version was published in the July 1890 issue of the American period ...

'') and female rage in '' The Society for Soulless Girls'' (her re-telling of ''

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde'' is an 1886 Gothic horror novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. It follows Gabriel John Utterson, a London-based legal practitioner who investigates a series of strange occurrences between ...

'').

Early life

Steven grew up in

Berwick-upon-Tweed Berwick-upon-Tweed (), sometimes known as Berwick-on-Tweed or simply Berwick, is a town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, south of the Anglo-Scottish border, and the northernmost town in England. The 2011 United Kingdom census recor ...

. She graduated with a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

(BA) in Journalism in 2013 and a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA or AM) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Those admitted to the degree have ...

(MA) in Creative Writing, both from

Northumbria University Northumbria University (legally the University of Northumbria at Newcastle) is a Public research university, public research university located in Newcastle upon Tyne, North East England, North East of England. It has been a university since 199 ...

Career

Steven began her career in magazine journalism. In 2014 at age 23 under the pseudonym Laura Salters, she signed her first book deal with Witness Impulse (a

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is a British–American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five (publishers), Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group USA, Hachette, Macmi ...

imprint), through which she published her

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to pu ...

, a

crime thriller Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, crime novel, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives or fiction that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professiona ...

titled ''Run Away'', in 2015. This was followed by her second crime novel ''Perfect Prey'' in 2016. Rebranding to Laura Steven, she gained prominence through her young adult ''Izzy O'Neill'' duology, the first of which, ''The Exact Opposite of Okay'', was published in 2018 by Electric Monkeys (an Egmont Books imprint). The sequel ''A Girl Called Shameless'' followed in 2019. Under the name Laura Kirkpatrick, she also published the middle-grade fantasy novel ''And Then I Turned into a Mermaid'' via Farshore Books (formerly Egmont Books, since acquired by HarperCollins UK). and its 2020 sequel ''Don't Tell Him I'm a Mermaid''. Also in 2020, Lime Pictures optioned the rights to adapt Steven's next young adult novel ''Love Hypothesis'' for television ahead of its release.

Bibliography

''Izzy O'Neill''

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''And Then I Turned into a Mermaid''

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Stand-alone novels

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References

External links

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Laura Steven
on

Goodreads Goodreads is an American social cataloging website and a subsidiary of Amazon that allows individuals to search its database of books, annotations, quotes, and reviews. Users can sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and readi ...

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Profile
at HarperCollins UK
Profile
at

Profile
at

Penguin Random House Penguin Random House Limited is a British-American multinational corporation, multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, with the merger of Penguin Books and Random House. Penguin Books was or ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Steven, Laura Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century pseudonymous writers Alumni of Northumbria University British women writers of young adult literature British writers of young adult literature English women novelists English comedy writers People from Berwick-upon-Tweed Pseudonymous women writers Writers from Northumberland 21st-century English women writers Living people