Soman Chainani

Soman Chainani grew up in Key Biscayne, Florida, and studied English and American Literature at Harvard. After graduation, he moved to New York City where he attended the MFA Film Program at Columbia University, and has subsequently worked in film as a director and editor.

Soman Chainani’s debut The School of Good and Evil – an enthralling slice of middle-grade fantasy – came out in 2013 and rocketed to immediate success: it has sold more than 3 million copies and been translated into 30 languages, as well as being nominated for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize 2014. Opening the eponymous series, The School of Good and Evil focuses on two girls at the titular establishment where students will become either fairytale heroes or villains. It was followed by A World Without Princes (2014), The Last Ever After (2015), Quests for Glory (2017), A Crystal of Time (2019) and One True King (2020). In 2021, Chainani delivered a gloriously illustrated collection of fairytale retellings, Beasts and Beauty, and his latest novel, Rise of the School of Good and Evil (2022), takes readers back to the enticing and dark Ever Never World of the School of Good and Evil.