<P> Magorian and Mister Tom won the annual Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a once - in - a-lifetime award judged by a panel of British children's writers . She was also a commended runner up for the Carnegie Medal from the British librarians, recognising the year's best English - language children's book published in the UK . </P> <P> The novel has been twice adapted as a musical, once as a play and once as a film, Goodnight Mister Tom (1998). In 2003, the novel was listed at number 49 on the BBC's survey The Big Read . The most recent theatrical adaptation, Goodnight Mister Tom won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Entertainment . </P> <P> In September 1939, as Britain stands on the brink of the war, many young children from the cities are evacuated to the countryside to escape an imminent German bombardment . Willie Beech, a boy from Deptford who is physically and emotionally abused by his mother, arrives at the home of Tom Oakley, a widower in his sixties who lives in the village of Little Weirwold . The boy is thinly clad, underfed and covered with painful bruises, and believes he is full of sin, a result of his upbringing by his mother, a domineering, insane, God - fearing widow . </P> <P> "Mister Tom", as William christens his new guardian, is reclusive and bad - tempered, and as such is avoided by the community . Willie lives with him as his Mother wants him to live with someone who is either religious or lives next to a church . Though initially distant, he is touched after discovering William's home - life and treats him with kindness and understanding, helping to educate him . Under his care, William begins to thrive, forming a small circle of friends at school among his classmates including fellow - evacuee Zach . He also becomes proficient in drawing and dramatics . As William is changed by Tom, so is Tom transformed by William's presence in his home . It is revealed that Tom lost his wife and baby son to scarletina some 40 years previously, and he has become reclusive because of this . </P>

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