Words by Smiley Team
A five-year-old girl has won a Guinness World Record by becoming the world’s youngest author.
Bella J. Dark from Weymouth, Dorset, has sold 2,000 copies of her book, and earned the record ‘youngest person to publish a book (female)’, beating the previous winner, Abhijita Gupta, who won the same award last year aged seven.
Bella wrote and illustrated the book – named 'The Lost Cat' – herself, with help from her mother Chelsie Syme. The book is about a cat who goes on an adventure, but learns an important lesson.
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"She has done the all the drawings by herself apart from one towards the back her older sister Lacey-May produced," Chelsie told the Dorset Echo. “Both her dad and I are very proud.”
"It's about a cat that goes out getting lost and realises she should not go out without her mum, so it has got a good message to it,” added Chelsie, who admitted to initially thinking it was ‘one of those things’ when Bella first announced she would be writing a book.
The book, published by Ginger Fyre Press, is available to purchase from Amazon and Waterstones for £6.
DONATE: You can donate to charities such as BookTrust who transform children and families lives through reading.
VOLUNTEER: You can give your time to ReadEasy, a charity that helps adults learn how to read and improve their literacy skills.
