Joanne Harris

Joanne Harris was born in Barnsley, Yorkshire, of an English father and a French mother. Her father, Robert (Bob) Short, taught French and German at Barnsley Girls' High School (later, Hall Balk School for Girls), and her mother was Jeannette Short (nee Payen) whom Bob first met on a trip to France, and who also later went on to teach at Barnsley Girls' High School. The family lived above Harris' grandparents' corner sweet shop until Harris was three. There was an outside toilet and no central heating, which horrified Jeannette, who was used to a warmer climate. Harris' mother did not speak English when she married, and so Harris spoke only French until she started school. This contributed to Harris' early sense of the family being "others" in the community. Harris' brother was born when Harris was ten: because of the wide age gap between them, she describes this as "being an only child and then being a second mother.", Harris spent the Easter and summer holidays with her French family on the island of Noirmoutier, where her grandfather had a house, a time she calls "wild and ldyllic". Harris spent much of her time there exploring the island, alone and undisturbed. These experiences later inspired her 2002 novel, Coastliners, and her 2003 novel, Holy Fools. Education Harris attended Wakefield Girls' High School and Barnsley Sixth Form College, then went on to study modern and mediaeval languages at St Catharine's College, Cambridge. She met her husband Kevin via graffiti on a school desk when they were both students at Barnsley Sixth Form College. Early influences Growing up, Harris was influenced by Norse mythology, classic adventure stories, including those of Jules Verne and Rider Haggard, and the work of Shirley Jackson, Victor Hugo, Ray Bradbury, Mervyn Peake and Emily Brontë. Although comics were banned in the home, she enjoyed Dr Who and ''Blake's 7'' as well as Westerns, samurai and horror films. As well as being an avid reader, Harris also loved to write, and began by copying the styles of authors she admired. == Career==

Teaching After a year as an accountant, which she later described as "like being trapped in a Terry Gilliam film", Harris trained as a teacher at the University of Sheffield, and for 15 years she taught modern languages, mostly at the independent Leeds Grammar School, which inspired her St. Oswald's books. Later she taught French literature at the University of Sheffield. While she was a teacher, Harris published the horror/gothic novels The Evil Seed and Sleep, Pale Sister, as well as Chocolat, a literary novel set in a French village, which allowed Harris to give up teaching to write full-time. Chocolat Harris describes Chocolat as being very different to her previous books. but she completed the first draft in four months, stating: "It felt as if I were finding my voice for the first time as an author, and it was exciting and new." The success of Chocolat came as a surprise to Harris, who had been told by Al Zuckerman, her agent's American counterpart and the author of How to Write the Blockbuster Novel, In an interview with The Yorkshire Post, she states: "I was completely unaware of the genie I was about to release into my ordered little world." and went on to sell 35 million copies worldwide. It won the Creative Freedom Award and was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel of the Year. In 2012 Chocolat was listed as number 61 in The Guardian's list of the "100 top best-selling books of all time". In 2000 Chocolat was adapted as a film, starring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp, with a screenplay by Robert Nelson Jacobs. The film received five Oscar nominations. Since then Harris' books have been published in more than 50 languages. Chocolat was followed by the novels Blackberry Wine (2000) and Five Quarters of the Orange (2001), described by The Guardian as "quirky, sensuous books set in the French countryside, in which food dominates events as a token of love, a bargaining chip, a gesture of defiance". They were followed by Coastliners in 2002 and Holy Fools in 2003, Chocolat sequels Although she did not originally intend to write a sequel to Chocolat, Harris has written four further novels in the series: The Lollipop Shoes in 2007 (titled The Girl With No Shadow in the US), Peaches for Monsieur le Curé in 2012 (Peaches for Father Francis in the US), and The Strawberry Thief in 2018. In 2025, Orion Books published a prequel to Chocolat, entitled Vianne. Psychological thrillers In 2006, Harris published Gentlemen and Players, a psychological thriller set in the fictional boys' grammar school of St Oswald's, inspired by her time as a teacher. alongside two more psychological thrillers, Blueeyedboy and Broken Light. Norse mythology Harris discovered the Norse myths via Dorothy G Horsford’s 1952 retelling for children, Thunder of the Gods. From this, Harris moved on to Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda, then went on to teach herself Old Norse in order to read the text in the original. In 2007, Harris published Runemarks, a fantasy novel based on Norse mythology, which reimagines a world after Ragnarök, in which some of the gods have survived. The sequel, Runelight, followed in 2012. In 2014 Harris published a prequel, The Gospel of Loki, a retelling of the myths from the perspective of the Trickster god, and its sequel, The Testament of Loki, in 2017. Harris' fantasy novels and novellas were published under the name Joanne M. Harris to distinguish them from her other work. Folklore and fairytale Harris has also published three novellas, A Pocketful of Crows, The Blue Salt Road, and Orfeia, loosely based on Child Ballads and illustrated by Bonnie Helen Hawkins, as well as two collections of short stories and numerous contributions to various charitable anthologies. In 2021, she published Honeycomb, a collection of original fairytales forming a mosaic novel, illustrated by Charles Vess. In 2024, she published a standalone romantic fantasy novel, The Moonlight Market, described as "a modern fairytale for adults", set in a fictionalised version of London. She has also published a Doctor Who novella, The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Time Traveller. Harris's novel Sleepers in the Snow is scheduled to be published in October 2026. == Themes ==

Repeated themes in Harris' books include: food as a means of understanding character; the dynamic between feasting and fasting; motherhood and the patriarchy; tensions within communities; outsiders and outcasts; religious intolerance and "the magic of everyday things". Her books are often said to evoke scents and tastes. Many of Harris' books are about women who challenge the status quo and the way in which women are perceived in society. Harris also regularly uses folklore and myth in her novels, giving a modern, original spin to traditional stories. == Style ==

Harris' style is characterized by the frequent use of dual first-person narratives.She also speaks of the importance of sensory impressions in her work, and of including all the senses. For each of her books she uses a dfferent scent as a writing "trigger", Of her bilingualism, she says: "French was my first language, but English is the language in which I write. I think this has made me particularly sensitive to certain sounds and cadences, as well as making me more than usually careful about grammar and spelling." == Reception ==

The books have been praised for their multi-layered storytelling, use of culinary metaphors and arresting plot twists. The Guardian describes Harris' books as "astringent, highly original and often subtly fantastic mainstream novels". The Irish Times says: "The Chocolat novels are poignant literary explorations of universal themes of pleasure and denial, the dangers of dogma, xenophobia and racism and the enduring power of love and understanding to eradicate the traumas of the past," with a Locus review calling Harris "exceedingly gifted at producing vivid imagery". Critics have remarked on her skill at "foreshadowing impending doom" and "unerring eye for school life". Some reviewers have questioned the plausibility of some of the plot twists, while acknowledging the compulsive nature of the read. == Journalism ==

Harris writes regularly for the press, and has written multiple travel pieces for The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Independent and The Times, as well as articles on more literary themes. In 2014 she wrote a review of the British Museum's Viking exhibition for The Telegraph. In 2017 she won a Fragrance Foundation Jasmine Award for an article on memory and scent, published in Good Housekeeping. == Other activities ==

Music Harris has been involved in a number of musical projects, including collaborating with Lucie Treacher and the Tête à Tête Opera Festival to create two mini-operas, performing with the Storytime Band and building a stage show based on her work, and co-writing and developing an original stage musical, Stunners, with Howard Goodall. In 2018 she and the Storytime Band were guests on the Christmas special of The Verb. Scent Harris has a keen interest in scent, and is a regular judge for the Fragrance Foundation Awards. In 2019 she worked with the fragrance company CPL Aromas to create a scent, Xocolatl, to 'illustrate' a passage from The Strawberry Thief. In 2025 she collaborated with the perfumer Sarah McCartney of 4160 Tuesdays to create ''Vianne's Confession, a scent made to accompany a passage from her novel Vianne''. Prize Judging She has judged the Orange (Women's) Prize, the Whitbread Prize, the Desmond Elliott Prize, the Betty Trask Prize, the Primadonna Prize, the Comedy Women in Print Award and the Winton Prize for Science Books. In 2024 Harris chaired the new Entente Littéraire Prize for Young Adult novels, a joint initiative of Queen Camilla and Brigitte Macron, sponsored by the Royal Society of Literature. In 2026 she chaired the inaugural Libraro Prize. Media Harris is a regular guest on radio and TV, appearing on ''Woman's Hour, A Good Read, Front Row, The Verb, Question Time, Loose Ends,With Great Pleasure, Saturday Live, In Tune, and the Today programme. In 2008 she appeared in the TV miniseries The Worlds of Fantasy. She appeared in two episodes of the TV series Inside Out: one in 2009 investigating the "real story" behind the death of Charlotte Bronte, the other 2010 on the topic of faith schools. In 2011 she featured in the episode The Villain of the four-part TV series Faulks On Fiction alongside Sebastian Faulks. In 2016 she appeared in one episode of Christmas University Challenge''. In 2021, Harris was a guest on BBC's Desert Island Discs, where her chosen book was the collected works of Victor Hugo, her luxury was her own shed, and the record she "would save from the waves" was Johnny Nash's "I Can See Clearly Now". In 2025, she was interviewed about her career by Jonathan Agnew for BBC Radio 5 Test Match Special. She is also active on social media, and in 2016 was nominated for a Shorty Award for her contributions. Charity work Harris is a patron of the charities Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), to which she donated the proceeds of her cookery books, and Plan UK. In 2012 she travelled to several villages in Togo as part of Plan UK's Because I Am a Girl project, later writing the short story Road Song based on her experiences. In 2009 she travelled to the Congo to report on MSF's work there, spending three weeks with aid workers in the danger zones to write an article on MSF's sleeping sickness programme. Her 2013 short story River Song was based on an encounter during this time. An account of the trip was published in Writing On The Edge: Great Contemporary Writers on the Front Line of Crisis, a collection of essays by writers including Martin Amis, Tracy Chevalier and A.A. Gill, with photographs by Tom Craig. Activism Harris was chair of the management committee of the Society of Authors for two terms from 2020 to 2024, being unanimously re-elected to the position in March 2022. She assisted in several SOA campaigns, including calling for more investment in libraries and the arts, calling for translators to have their names on the cover of books, and raising awareness on author pay and conditions. In 2022 she appeared on the Bookseller's list of the 150 most influential people in publishing. She has also campaigned against library closures, has called for literary festivals to pay contributors, has spoken out in favour of trigger warnings in books, has spoken out against sexism in publishing, and the gendering of children's books. In 2015, Harris launched a protest against the Clean Reader app, which had been designed to replace profanities in books with "clean" alternatives, calling it "censorship, not by the state, but by a religious minority". This campaign, which was supported by many other authors, including Chuck Wendig, Charles Stross and Margaret Atwood, led to the speedy removal of the app. In 2022 a members' vote was raised calling for Harris to stand down as chair of the SOA, in relation to the society's stance on protecting free speech. The motion was defeated, with 81% voting against. Harris became a member of the Board of the Authors' Licensing and Collecting Society in 2019, and was re-elected in 2021. During this time she campaigned against the unregulated use of generative AI, called for "an industry-wide standard to be introduced" for festivals to pay their contributors, campaigned for a wider awareness of copyright issues and the importance of fair pay for authors. She stepped down from the post in 2024, having served two terms. In 2025 she signed an open letter alongside Richard Osman, Kate Mosse and Val McDermid, calling for the UK government "to hold Meta accountable over its use of copyrighted books to train artificial intelligence." == Honours and awards ==

Harris is the holder of honorary doctorates in literature from the University of Huddersfield and the University of Sheffield, and is an Honorary Fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge. Harris was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2013 Birthday Honours and Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2022 Birthday Honours for services to literature. In 2022, she was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Literary awards • Chocolat (2001): Shortlisted: Whitbread Novel of the Year Award (2000); nominated, USC Scripter Awards (2001); winner: Creative Freedm Award (2000); Whitaker Platinum Award (2012). • Blackberry Wine: Winner; Whitaker Gold Award (2002); Salon Du Livre Gourmand (Gourmand Awards): International category: Drinks Literature (2000). • Five Quarters of the Orange: Longlisted for the 2002 Orange Prize. Shortlisted: Popular Fiction category WH Smith Literary Award 2002; Winner; Premio Grinzane Cavour (Italy, 2002) • Holy Fools: Longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award. • The French Kitchen (with Fran Warde): 2005 Winner of the Golden Ladle for Best Soft Cover Recipe Book Over US$25 in Le Cordon Bleu World Food Media Awards. • Gentlemen & Players: Shortlisted for the Edgar Award Best Novel, 2007 (USA) and the Grand Prix du Polar de Cognac (France). • Flavours of Childhood (co-written for the BBC Radio 4 series First Taste with poet Sean O'Brien): Winner of the Glenfiddich Award Food and Drink Award for broadcasting, 2006. • The Gospel of Loki: Finalist of the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature, 2015. • Every Scent Tells a Tale (a piece written for Good Housekeeping): Winner of Fragrance Foundation Jasmine Award (Literary Category), 2017. • A Pocketful of Crows: Shortlisted for 2018 British Fantasy Award for Best Novella. ==Personal life==

Harris lives in Yorkshire with her husband Kevin, and has a son. She works from a shed in her garden. Harris was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020, and discussed the diagnosis and her ongoing treatment on social media and at the Hay Festival. In 2023, she was declared cancer-free, and wrote in The Guardian that the experience had made her reassess her priorities and had given her back her voice. She has stated that she has a form of synaesthesia "in which colours in bright light trigger scents". She also suffers from seasonal affective disorder (SAD) in winter, and has dyscalculia, an inability to process numbers. == Publications ==

Gothic novels • • Chocolat series • • (US title: The Girl With No Shadow, April 2008) • (US title: Peaches for Father Francis) • • Books set in France • • • • Cookery books (with Fran Warde) • • • Short story collections • • Malbry series • (2005) • (2016) • (2021) • (2010) • Rune series • (2007 in the UK, 2008 in the US) as Joanne M. Harris • (September 2011 in the UK) as Joanne M. Harris • (February 2014), as Joanne M. Harris • (2018) (as Joanne M. Harris) Novellas • (October 2014). Doctor Who novella. • (2017) a folklore-inspired novella (as Joanne M. Harris), illustrated by Bonnie Hawkins. • (2018) (as Joanne M. Harris). Illustrated by Bonnie Hawkins. • (2020) (as Joanne M. Harris). Illustrated by Bonnie Hawkins. On writing • (2020) a self-help book for writers. Illustrated by Moose Alain. Fantasy and science fiction • (2021) (as Joanne M. Harris). Illustrated by Charles Vess. • (2023). Omnibus edition of three folklore-inspired novellas (A Pocketful of Crows, The Blue Salt Road and Orfeia), plus additional stories. Illustrated by Bonnie Helen Hawkins. • Stories in anthologies • A collection of stories in aid of Piggybank Kids.Edited by J.K. Rowling. • A collection of stories in aid of Breast Cancer UK. • A collection of stories in aid of Piggybank Kids. • A collection of stories in aid of Piggybank Kids. • A collection in aid of Piggybank Kids. • A collection of erotic stories by well-known female writers. • Charity anthology in aid of Plan UK. • A collection of fantasy tales, edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio. (Winner of the 2010 Shirley Jackson Award for Best Anthology) • A collection of eyewitness accounts by well-known authors of extreme conditions and war-torn locations. In aid of MSF. • Charity anthology in aid of the Woodland Trust. • Charity anthology in aid of the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition. • • Edited by David Miller. • A collection of Doctor Who stories by various authors, including the Harris novella The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Time Traveller. • An anthology of stories on the subject of curses, edited by Marie O'Regan and Paul Kane. Audiobooks narrated by Joanne Harris • • • • • • • • • • • • • == References ==