Welcome to LMElliott.com

Welcome to L.M. Elliott.com. If you’re looking for L.M. Elliott or Laura Malone Elliott, you’ve found the right place. I have two “by-lines” – my full name for picture books and L.M. for novels. I started using L.M. with my WWII novel, Under a War-torn Sky, which is about a downed B-24 bomber pilot saved by the French Resistance. My publisher thought a shorter name would sound more like a war correspondent and be better for that story. It also cloaked my gender, a kind of tradition for women who write for youth such as S.E. Hinton (The Outsiders) or J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter). Long ago, George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) even had to take on a male name to write professionally. There are more surprises and explanations inside….

Thanks to Chris Hample for designing such an imaginative site—a perfect example of the creative collaboration set up by books. Readers, illustrators, teachers, and librarians take my words, interpret them, and add their own thoughts, making a book a kind of wondrous living thing. For instance: Readers kept asking for a sequel to Under a War-torn Sky—what happens next to Henry, Pierre, Claudette. Because of you, I’ve “gone back” to France to find out. A Troubled Peace comes out August 2009. Click here to read sample chapters!